Flipping Through Poems Like the Pages of a Magazine
How one book got me hooked on poetry
Like most people my age, the education system did a thorough job of killing any spark of interest I may have once had in poetry. The more my teachers droned on about the symbolism of a poem or pulled meanings of lines seemingly out of thin air, the more convinced I was that it was all bullshit.
Then the universe intervened. Miss Taggart was the first salvo in the cosmic battle over my poetry soul. She was the mean English teacher. The one you prayed you didn’t get, the one helicopter parents pulled their kids from, the one who would actually fail you for not doing satisfactory work.
I was a chronic underachiever, indifferent to my classes but deeply curious about the world. For reasons I will never fathom, Miss Taggart took an immediate liking to me. Whatever the reason, she introduced me to Emerson, Thoreau, and the Transcendentalists in her American Literature class, and my mind was blown.
The second salvo was in the form of the popular movie Dead Poet’s Society. I had missed the movie when it was released in theaters right before I entered high school. But it was released on video cassette right as I was learning about Thoreau in American Literature.
