Sybil Priebe
Instructor
Multi-Genre Paper
13 Apr 04
Now that I know who I am, what do
I do with her?
To Whom This May Concern:
Maybe I should start with this: I
have always liked school. I have always liked learning, sitting and taking in
whatever knowledge my teachers could lend me, and I have
loved creating. Letting my thoughts grow into actual beings.
And as Steve Ward, one of my undergraduate professors,
says: “It is in the process of creating where we
learn the most. Not in the product.”
my whole being is a dark chant
which will carry you
perpetuating you
to the dawn of eternal growths and blossomings
in this chant i sighed you sighed
in the chant
i grafted you to the tree to the water to the fire.
So, my process began as a junior
in high school. That is where my need, my desire, to compose started really. I
became alive then I think.
It is a distinct moment in that class that I remember "seeing" in
my blurred old age memory now.
Sitting behind
I would sit hunched over in class
and highlight their words. That's where it began. What amazes me, to this day,
is that at that time I put those emotions with words on the back burner. That
same year, I took drafting technology classes at NDSCS and fell in love with
the designs of floor plans. I urged my parents to allow me to go to
life is perhaps
a long street through which a woman holding a basket
passes everyday
life is perhaps
a rope with which a man hangs himself from a branch
Then, during my freshmen year of college, depression hit once again.
Suddenly, I questioned everything. I went on a bagel-a-day diet. I napped with a growling
stomach and skipped classes. Slowly, I met people, fell for another boy, and
tried with all my might to reach out of this hole that I seemed to have thrown
myself into.
life is perhaps a child returning
from school.
life is perhaps lighting up a cigarette
in the narcotic repose between two love-makings
or the absent gaze of a passerby
who takes off his hat to another passerby
with meaningless smile and a good morning.
"They"
say if you want to change something, fall in love. Love is insane that way, I
guess. So, in Jason, I found parts of myself that I seemed
to have lost after high school. My goofiness and my
femininity. He also brought back a false sense of security for me. I
started to depend on him. My studies started to lack, and even though I
changed my major to English Education, I still felt unsure about my future. My mother couldn't understand why
I wanted to be a teacher rather than an architect, and Jason looked at my
writings and wondered why I didn't sound more mature. The only people, at that
time, that seemed to have faith in me and my abilities were me, my siblings,
and my father.
life is perhaps that enclosed
moment
when my gaze destroys itself in the pupil of your eyes.
and it is in the feeling
which i will put into the Moons impression
and the Nights perception
in a room as big as loneliness
my heart
which is as big as love
looks at the simple pretexts of it happiness
at the beautiful decay of flowers in the vase
at the sapling you planted in our garden
and the songs of canaries
which sing to the size of the window.
ah
this is my lot
Teaching
was and is still my religion. This is how I give back to society. I told this
to the people in
my lot is
a sky which is taken away at the drop of a curtain
my lot is going down a flight of disused stairs
to regain something amid putrefaction and nostalgia
my lot is sad promenade in the garden of memories
and dying in the grief of a voice which tells me
I
really, truly started to find myself in
But
being alone has always been easy for me. I could do the Walden thing. I could
live alone on a lake without much contact with people and be OKAY. So, in my happy
solitude, I threw my passions and energy into my teaching, into getting to know
my students.
i love
your hands.i will plant my hands in the garden
i will grow i know i know i know
and swallows will lay eggs
in the hollows of my ink-stained hands.
I
struggled. I went home at
i shall wear
a pair of twin cherries as earrings
and i shall put dahlia petals on my fingernails
But
I couldn't keep up the facade for long. I would defend myself to enough
people and teach my with my liberal ways. Well,
life doesn't work out that way most times.
Suddenly,
in March, I got the letter from the superintendent asking me to meet with him
and the principal about "next year's curriculum goals" AND when I
asked if I should bring books or typed up plans and he said NO..
I knew. I knew. Female intuition kicked in. I was about to get fired. In pure
shock, I sat there as he told me that I, Sybil Priebe,
someone who ALWAYS reached her goals.. always had done everything RIGHT in her whole life, had, in
fact, not added up to "district standards" as a teacher.
But I knew who I was, and I was not about to be defeated. So that same day, after writing
an e-mail to all my family and friends, I took out the Graduate School
application that I had hidden in my desk. I filled out the missing parts, found
some sample writings in my file cabinet, and used the postage from the school
that was about to screw me over to mail it up to North Dakota State. I would go
back to the campus that challenged me in the first place.
there is an alley
where the boys who were in love with me
still loiter with the same unkempt hair
thin necks and bony legs
and think of the innocent smiles of a girl
who was blown away by the wind one night.
there is an alley
which my heart stolen
from the streets of my childhood.
the journey of a form along the line of time
inseminating the line of time with the form
a form conscious of an image
coming back from a feast in a mirror.
We
all have hurdles. We all have to find ways to jump them without blaming others.
I know now that I have a path. Some people are not allowed the chance to
realize their path in life. I am lucky enough to know that teaching and writing
is where I want to be. I foresee many more struggles, but I am willing to not
let them get me down. I will not let people make me question who I am. I know.
And only I know.
and it is in this way
that someone dies
and someone lives on.
no fisherman shall ever find a
pearl in a small brook
which empties into a pool.
i know a sad little fairy
who lives in an ocean
and ever so softly plays her heart into a magic flute
a sad little fairy
who dies with one kiss each night
and is reborn with one kiss each dawn.
this poem is by furough farrokhazad
Sincerely,
Sybil Priebe
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*Genres
used:
1-Letter
2-Essay
3-Poem
4-Journal
Entry
5-Quote
*For Paper
3- 5 genres must be used; the essay itself counts as one. We’ve written a lot
of other genres this semester… find pieces of each to use in your Paper 3.