#keith leonard

[havingapoemwithyou]

Statement of Teaching Philosophy by Keith Leonard

[therisingfog]

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Keith Leonard

[missedstations]

“More Frank” - Keith Leonard

When Elaine de Kooning painted Frank O'Hara, she painted his face then smudged it away. "It was more Frank," she said. I've been thinking, too, of Rilke saying he just wanted to be a final thing. The line between art and laundry erased. I like to run the dishwasher at night then place all the clean, clear glasses in a neat row each morning. I put my yellow coffee cup in the empty rack. I drive to work and grade my papers and peer over the cliff edge of our bank account, muttering, "No stairs." In a myth, Plato lets the dead choose what life they will lead when next reborn. It's taking Odysseus a long time. Of course it is. He's looking for an uneventful life. He's finding so few to choose from. This one pressing a bag of ice to a child's forehead. This one drawing a comb through his daughter's tangled hair.

[birdsagainstgravity]

Rock Pigeon (Feral Pigeon) (Columba livia (Feral Pigeon))

© Keith Leonard

[goreprofonde]

“One can look villainous, but what if beauty is the beginning of a terror we can barely stand? So says Rilke. So says the Cyclops, the ogre, and the monster taunted by flame. There was a time I was afraid of him—this father carrying wood in his arms like a babe.”

- Keith Leonard, Ode to the Grotesque.

[revmeg]

...I was my own storm once, so young and eager to raise the sail of my wanting, and I just wanted to tell you I love this old boat, this settled-in thing.

from “Keel” in Ramshackle Ode by Keith Leonard, p. 2

[principleofplenitude]

My students want certainty. They want it so badly. They respect science and have memorized complex formulas. I don’t know how to tell my students their parents are still just as scared. The bullies get bigger and vaguer and you cannot punch a cloud. I have eulogies for all my loved ones prepared, but cannot include this fact in my lesson plans. The best teacher I ever had told me to meet him at the basketball court. We played pick-up for hours. By the end, I lay panting on the hardwood and couldn’t so much as stand. He told me to describe the pain in my chest. I tried. I couldn’t find the words. Not exactly. Listen, he said, that’s where language ends.

Keith Leonard, “Statement of Teaching Philosophy”