Two vast and trunkless legs of stone...

Today, the peerless beFrank posted about the opening of a new hotel in Las Vegas. I read the title of the post, Two vast and trunkless legs of stone, the same title I gave this post, and knew instantly what it was he was referring to. It was poetry.

Until 9th grade, I was a shy, introverted bookworm interested mostly in science fiction and survivalism. I didn't have much in the way of friends. I wasn't much of a person. Then, in 9th grade, I had an English teacher named Wilbur Hanson.

Some people never get a teacher like Mr. Hanson. You poor, deprived souls. There are teachers too young and inexperienced to maintain order in a classroom or present lessons in a way that can be absorbed. There are teachers too old and jaded to think that they can make a difference, too bitter or disillusioned to keep giving their best effort. There are teachers, young, old or otherwise, who are good teachers, but simply follow the course outlines and teach their subject without connecting to the students, without having a major impact on those still-malleable personalities.

And then, there are teachers like Mr. Hanson, a gift from the gods, a teacher who makes learning exciting, who has a passion for his work and for life, who looks into the soul of each of his students, finds whatever flickers of spirit still thrive, even in the Los Angeles Unified School District, and nurtures those tiny sparks into flame.

"The child is the father of the man!"

That is what Mr. Hanson quoted one day. Did he tell us what that meant? No. He asked us what that meant. Made us think about it. Let us share our thoughts. Mr. Hanson knew that there are no teachers, there are only students. And he made us be students. I hope he realized that, while the child is the father of the man, that he, Mr. Hanson, was the father of the child. It was he who taught the child to raise himself to be a man. For that is what he did for me.

Mr. Hanson ignored my rough-hewn exterior, my shirking and shrinking from life, reached in with both hands and dragged me into the world. Showed me that I had things to say, and how to say them. He drew us all out, made us all friends, challenged us to help ourselves and the students next to us.

He taught us Shakespeare. He taught us Greek mythology. He taught us poetry. He taught us to understand symbolism. He taught us to use symbolism. He taught us.

He gave us Ozymandias, king of kings. Let us discover the hubris that power can infect a man with.

Thank you, beFrank, for reminding me of the profound debt that I owe Mr. Hanson and the other great teachers out there. Teachers like Homer, and Shakespeare, and Robert Heinlein.

And thank you, Mr. Hanson, wherever you are.

Ozymandias I met a traveler from an antique land Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand, Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown, And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command, Tell that its sculptor well those passions read, Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things, The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed, And on the pedestal these words appear: "My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings: Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!" Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare The lone and level sands stretch far away. -Percy Bysshe Shelley 1792-1822

Blog Tag: Opinion