Portrait of a Poet as a Teacher
customImage
Andy Eaton in his element with students at MSA.
As an English teacher at MSA, Dr. Andy Eaton cares less about the ideas he brings to class, and more about the ideas his students discover. Dr. Eaton prioritizes creating an environment where everyone is heard. When students are grappling with their words, he feels for the heart of their sentiment and sieves their muddy water, exposing the golden nuggets of wisdom his students did not realize they were about to stumble upon. He does more than just hearing someone speak; by absorbing his students’ beliefs as his own for a while, he keeps his students company in the discovery of their ideas. He guides them to expand on their convictions, offering the language of a seasoned mind if they need it.
It is no surprise that the man whose fruit of teaching stems from his ability to observe, also finds, at the center of his life, the art of paying attention, or crafting poems. Dr. Eaton smells out connections between the tiny, unnoticed things. He does not need a new subject or place to write something new; he lets himself simply be wherever he is, noticing what is right in front of him.
Read two of Dr. Eaton’s published works below.
Written by Ben Allen, Student-Editor of The Bell Tower Magazine
“That best portion of a good man’s life; His little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love. – William Wordsworth.”
Each Morning
During a time of great need
we came easily
under the influence of light—
the idea of pattern disappeared
into the patternlessness of gathering
leaves wet in the street.
How could it arrive even here,
where we were wondering how,
in this house, one among many
rows of reproduced foundations.
How could it not? we seem to
ask of the window. Our faces
look out on a garden
once strange to us. We have
trimmed it back and yet,
and yet. The wooden fence
grays under the canopy,
softens in returning
winds through the middle
of each season. Here, we watch
what we are doing. Each morning,
if only it could be so, would find
you and me stepping around
the trees, the first taste of
sunlight dripping off
our lips,
both of us raising our hands.
(The Yale Review)
Some Trees, Too
Warm morning on the back deck—
slow yoga of the bamboo,
discipline of the squirrel.
Patience of the chestnut snack
dropped and lost into a dry
leaf shuffle, then found. Gray claws
in the green and tan bamboo
I hear behind me. Slow wave
on the back deck. I want joy
I do not know I have been
living. I want peace beyond
the bounds of my own body.
Some life in the afterlife.
Some trees, too. A little bird-
song even. The way I get
up and move on: all that gone—
days like my lost eyelashes,
just dry leaves curled there and here,
a few in the gutter, one
or two at my feet, before
someone sweeps the fallen all away.
Is anyone incapable of finding
a figure for loss? Is there
actual silence inside
the body? Actual light as well?
I can’t decide if I want this
world or another.
Better not; I’d better not.
(Image Journal)
