Apr 9, 2013 Awake in Real Time: Coffee-induced Meditations and Journal Entries, Original Poetry, Reading, Writing, Thinking, Teaching and Learning
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3o8jL1BXMdk]
Response to “Pigeon” by Anthony Green
©Vijaya Sundaram
April 9th, 2013
[The above YouTube video shows the film “Pigeon” by Anthony Green. This was the prompt I put up today on my “smartboard” in class (we have been studying books set in the Nazi-Holocaust period for the past few weeks). Students watched this 11-minute film and then we had a discussion about the significance of the different acts of kindness or unkindness in the film. We also discussed the symbolism in all the visuals (I don’t want to go all school-teacherish on you here), as well as the arresting imagery, acting and directing.
This was followed by a writing assignment. Students had to write a poem-response to this film, telling the story itself, or using the larger symbolism to zoom in on what moved them. They were deeply affected by the film, and the poems they came up with were beautiful.
I told them that I, too, would write while they wrote. So, I managed to write in four out of five of my class periods today.] Here is the first of the four poems I wrote (unedited, sorry, no time to tweak things. Will do that later):
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Shema Yisrael
Response poem to the film “Pigeon”
©Vijaya Sundaram
April 9th, 2013
Shema Yisrael
Stranded on the island
I await my deliverance
Shema Yisrael
Pigeon at my feet
Crumbs for its survival
Shema Yisrael
I have lost all, lost all
My papers, my self, my life.
Shema Yisrael
I try and sidestep my fate
Waiting is my wasteland
Shema Yisrael
Here are guards, inexorable as death
I die by degrees, in a sweat of fear
Shema Yisrael
Angel in human form sees
My loss, transforms into demoness
Shema Yisrael
I had a wife, and now a new one,
Who beats me about the shoulders.
Shema Yisrael
Guards aim death at her, “Papers!”
She mocks me, her “husband.”
Shema Yisrael
They laugh at us, mock me; they see she
“Wears the pants,” and then they leave.
Shema Yisrael
Bless this angel of mercy, this wife
Who delivered me from death, from hell
Shema Yisrael
May her act not go unnoticed
May she find a place among the angels.
Shema Yisrael
May the pigeons and doves among us
Find their saviors, may they fly in peace.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The End ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Sh’ma Yisrael Adonai Eloheinu Adonai Eḥad
(Hear, O Israel: the Lord is our God, the Lord is One)
Disclaimer: I am not a Jewish person, nor a believer of any sort. However, I believe deeply in the power of prayer to steady ourselves, when we’re cast afloat, rudderless, on an open sea. It’s a centering mechanism. It’s good. It can only calm us, not hurt us.
Tags: #humanity, #kindness, #NaPoWriMo, #Resistance, #Teaching, Deliverance, Goodness, Mercy, poem-response to film "Pigeon" by Anthony Green, Shema