NVN Sunday: A TEACHER’S PRAYER
by Michelle DeRose
Texas schoolchildren as young as four years old are being given Winnie-the-Pooh cartoon books, teaching them to “run, hide, fight” if a gunman enters their building. —The Guardian, May 25, 2023
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If we must die in classrooms barricaded by books stacked against doors, praying that the weight of words makes metal wade through air made dense with sentences, that students find a window to safety with a tolerable drop, that we stop the onslaught just long enough for a few to return to their own rooms, may we at least select the books.
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Michelle DeRose has been teaching English at the college level for thirty-five years. Some of her most recent poetry can be found in As You Were: Military Experience and the Arts, Dunes Review, The Lakeshore Review, The Healing Muse, and Making Waves.