Beyond The Sentence

Today in class we looked at Eminem’s ‘Love the Way You Lie’ and the darker side of love. We talked about the song’s paradoxes, the confusion and pain. We discussed the parallel's between poetry and rap and how the crafting of musical lyrics sometimes gets overlooked. We were not in our usual classroom but in the outdoor mess area which is open on all sides. There was a lot unsaid today, and even the writing output of the class was more self-conscious than usual. As we sat there with people all around, I wondered how many writers would be able to write authentically in such a public space. My colleague Peter and I are always so impressed with the resilience of our students and their determination to write whatever the circumstances. I Hate Love by T.M. Love is like flowers grows on its own glory When he came into my life he was quiet, gentle; it was so simple. I gave room to my heart So strong he held my hand and led me by the heart. Love was p

Today in class we thought about, wrote about, and talked about chance. Interestingly, not one of the class linked the topic to the reasons they are in prison. It felt like the beginning of a topic and I expect the class will bring it up again later. The writing prompt was a pair of dice and nearly everyone in the class wrote, 'Life is a game of chance' somewhere. It is always interesting to see how the students approach each writing task so differently. We had quite a few pieces in what we call the Commentary genre, so many that we had to further sub-classify into general commentary, spoken word - usually more polemic than didactic, and letters. The dice prompt produced all three, as well as short stories and poetry. One student wrote about the power of dice and we talked about giving power over to chance. We also spent time this morning reading and recognising the featured pieces in this blog so far. Each student whose piece is chosen to represent the class out