How Do They Loathe Us? - Fred Smith's Sonnet to Tisch, Duncan et al.

Fred wrote a sonnet dedicated to Arne Duncan, New York State Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch and Mayor Michael Bloomberg and  their respective departments of education, as well as test monger Pearson.  He says, "In their nonfiction, data-cramped world, this is the kind of poetry they inspire."

How Do They Loathe Us?


How do they loathe us? Let me count the ways.

They loathe us deepmost to the very core.

Teachers, parents they evenly abhor--

Children more so in their tend’rest days.

They loathe us blind-eyed with “high standards” rage,

Misusing tests to give each one a score.

They loathe us thus and thus turn gold to straw.

They loathe us in a frenzied death-embrace:


Loathe by every unfounded decision,

Declaring that we have no other choices;

Loathe us, turning classrooms into prisons.

They loathe us darkly and ignore our voices;

Worship at the shrine of imprecision,

Foreclose the future, loathe us and rejoice.


~Fred Smith, Change the Stakes (with apologies to EBB)

Stay cool, ask your ardent followers to put some iambs together in sonnet form, and compose their own litany of loathing.