The Art of Teaching II by Hannah Lowe

Hannah Lowe is a British poet born in Essex in 1976. She was a teacher of literature for many years before she started writing her own poetry. Today, she is a lecturer in creative writing at Brunel University in London.

'The Art of Teaching II' is from her book The Kids, which is a collection of modern sonnets inspired by her time as a teacher in a London school. In this particular poem, we meet a teacher who is struggling with the challenges of trying to engage students in a process of learning that they can’t see has any real relevance to them. As we read the poem, we can feel the lack of enthusiasm and energy that characterises good teaching, and we clearly feel the complete lack of interest among the students and the resignation from the teacher.

Boredom hangs like a low cloud in the classroom.
Each page we read is a step up a mountain
in gluey boots. Even the clock-face is pained
and yes, I'm sure now, ticking slower. If gloom
has a sound, it's the voice of Leroy reading
Frankenstein aloud. And if we break
to talk, I know my questions are feeble sparks
that won't ignite my students' barely beating

hearts. There is no volta here, no turn,
yet more of the same: the cloud sinking ever lower,
the air damper, yet more rain. And the task
is unchanging, like spending years chasing a monster
you yourself create. Leroy asks,
if he can stop reading. I say, for now, he can.

Copyright © Hannah Lowe.
Bloodaxe Books