The last time I taught this course a couple of years ago, one of my students held me accountable to the same maxim I applied to them: Writers Write. No excuses. This really helped to revitalize my creative energy, which ultimately led to the completion of The Most Educated Idiot I Know.
This semester my class is engaged in an interdisciplinary project with a painting class. My students wrote poems, which the painting students then used as inspiration to create visual art.
Once again, one of my students (McKenzie Evans) has involved me in the same process as the rest of the class. Below is a poem I had published a few years ago in a regional literary magazine. I showed it to the class as an example of the use of both imagery and alliteration. The student took it upon herself to use the poem to inspire her painting, which is shown below the poem.
The Prodigal Drosophila
The fruit fly, a feckless, fecund little fellow like so many owes his existence to the fermentation process.
Conceived on a Saturday night in an overripe peach, he is content to wallow his maggoty youth in a brandied hedonism until there is nothing left to consume.
From there, he meanders away and perches on a sour mop or falls into a slimy drain, only to eke out enough sludge to sustain him for the last days of his only week of life.
I absolutely love the fruit fly drinking from the straw and wearing a sombrero. This makes me want to go have a Margarita and chips and cheese at a local Mexican restaurant.
Thanks, McKenzie!
