Teaching, a textual intervention poem

     A few weeks ago, as I was decluttering my desk, I found a worksheet with poems by the greek poet Kavafis. Most of you may have read "ITHACA" as it has been translated into English.

I decided to play with words and intervene on the text, keeping the same syntax. (I have to admit that the original idea was Luke's Prodromou)

Teaching is always on my mind so...

Teaching

As you set out for Teaching
hope your journey  is a long one,
full of adventure, full of knowledge.
Difficult students and know-alls
angry learners—don’t be afraid of them:
you’ll never find things like that on your way
as long as you keep your thoughts raised high,
as long as a rare excitement
stirs your spirit and your body.
Difficult students and know-alls
wild learners—you won’t encounter them
unless you bring them along inside your soul,
unless your soul sets them up in front of you.

Hope your journey is a long one.
May there be many a winter morning when,
with what pleasure, what joy,
you come into classrooms seen for the first time;
may you stop at students’ desks
to check fine homework,
reading and writing, listening and speaking,
creative ideas of every kind—

May you distribute many worksheets  
produce videos and plays

Write newsletters and create posters

as many imaginative projects as you can;
and may you visit many foreign countries
to gather cultural knowledge from their inhabitants.
Keep  Teaching always in your mind.
Arriving there is what you are destined for.
But do not hurry the journey at all.
Better if it lasts for years,
so you gain lots of experience and memories

wealthy with all you have gained on the way,
not expecting Teaching to make you rich.

Teaching gave you the marvelous journey.
Without it you would not have set out.
It has nothing left to give you now. 
And if you find it poor, Teaching won’t have fooled you.
Wise as you will have become, so full of experience,
you will have understood by then 
what educational matters mean.