Bel Kaufman - Up The Down Staircase

LIFE, BE NOT PROUD

Life, be not proud, thou hast made many mistakes tho thou hadst had a chance to be beautiful, yet thou hadst fouled it up. Why is there sufering and troubles galore? Why is there man's inhumanity to man? Why is there prejudice between all the races? Why is there jails and hoor houses and lynches and unemployment? Why is there death? Life, be not proud!

SNOW

The snow lies on mountain and dale like a naked woman exposing its glistering white body voluptously and proud of her nakedness under the warm sun. Soon the warm sun will melt it. What then?

THE SUBWAY

The subway is a monster giant snake that crawls inside the Bowels of the Earth, emerging to vomit forth its food at the different stations. It then swallows another belly full of us to crawl into the Bowels where darkness dwells. Who knows when it will re-emerge again?

WHY DO I LOVE?

Brown throated is my love and potent are his groins and laughing are his long lashed eyes. The songs he sings are many. His lips, insistent with passion's flame, are smooth upon my young mouth. Although my love doth walk with feet of clay upon my heart, I do not care: I love. Why do I love? I know not. I only know I love.

LIFE REFLECTED IN THE TELEVISION EYE

I see the television eye. It does not see me albeit I scream jump laugh weep rant rage stick out my tongue at it. Within the television eye, among the shadows and the horizontal streaks the little people live and love and eat and die interupted by commercials. While I, yes I, posess the power to turn them off whenever I feel like it. Just so to God are we as they, for Lo! He can stop our mouths while in the middle of a sentence and snap our hearts in twain. His Eye sees us albeit we do not see Him. What is God?—God is the Universal Antenna.

THE FUTURE?

The question I ask can never be answered while in the proccess of being asked. For I inquire about the Future. And only the Future can tell about itself. Is it there for us? We're a fast breed because we don't know if there is time ahead or total anihilation of Man. I sometimes wonder, what will become of me and my forthcoming children?

*

ACENTUATE THE POSITIVE

Who?

What?

When?

Where?

Why?

How?

O foolish ? mark, it doesn't matter. What matters is the ! To ? is to be told how bad you are and various problems better not to know. So only live with !

TO WHAT SHALL I COMPARE THEE TO?

You are to me a Sunday morning smelling of frying bacon and promises of more. You are to me a racing car at 95 miles per hr. that no one else has. You are to me a lazy curtesan in her feminine bed room with ostrich feathers fanning her brow. You are to me a fresh meadowland. You are to me the sounds of the City that spell a band of gypsies with tamburines and hunking cars and tooting trucks’ symphony or the hot beat of Rock n Roll that jerks a thousand feet. You are to me the end of the line. But what am I to you?

INTEGRATION

They speak of Integration. It's a word. What does it mean: a bus? a cop? a school? a headline? a tomstone? a neighbor's fight? a parent's yells? a speech? a boycot? a politician? It's all the same to me for words are only words. Yet deep and dark, deeper than any well and darker than any skin something lies and slumbers. Unburry it and hearken what it says. A simple truth: My brother.

UNTITLED

To be

Or not to be—

By this

I mean:

To be myself?

(Who am I though?)

Or else to be

What my parents

(Alas, poor Yorik, I knew them well!)

Would like me to be

Because

Of their own regrets

Or

What the World expects?

(The choice is tough)

The rest is silence ....

* THE OLD MAN

The old man just stood there. Just stood. There. Where I was. A reproach? To my youth, perhaps. To my good health. His chest was sunk. His hands shook with palsy. Finished. Through. Finis. His sands of time had run. But mine had just begun. Someday I too. Not now. Not yet. Why, then, do I feel so guilty?

THE MURDERER

I saw him scuttling like a crook, making his fearful way, stelthy among the dirty dishes crustied with grease in the sink, bearing a morsle of food to his secret sons behind the drain board. How fearful were his eyes. Shall I kill him?

(Mrs. Schachter—Is it clear I am talking about a cockaroach?)

MONTHLY REPORT ON PHYSICAL CONDITION OF ROOM

ROOM: 304

TEACHER: s. BARRETT – OCT. 12

Door off hinge

Sliding wardrobe panel doesn't close; blackboard on it can't be used.

Book closet, back of room, broken; shelf splintered.

Window in back, right, broken.

Teacher's desk missing two drawers.

Radiator keeps clanging.

( Same conditions prevail as in last month's report , with addition of radiator. Hole in window getting bigger, though. Wind and rain blowing in. Also, glass

crunching underfoot.

S. Barrett

Dear Miss Barrett,

You have neglected to send in attendance sheet for today.

Sadie Finch

Chief Clerk

Dear Miss Finch,

The reason is that Linda Rosen chose to wear a pink sweater and fuchsia stretch pants to school this morning. She was seen by Mr. McHabe, who invited her to cool her heels in the office. She was also seen by the boys in my homeroom, who migrated en masse to her vicinity. Since we had no quorum, I couldn't take attendance. I will do so this afternoon—unless they have followed her like lemmings into the sea and are all drowned.

S. Barrett

FROM: JAMES J. MCHABE, ADM. ASST.

TO: Miss S. Barrett

Dear Miss Barrett,

All out of board erasers. All out of red pencils. Requisition for window-poles has been sent to the Board last spring—we must be patient.

There has been an epidemic of chalk-stealing. Please keep chalk under lock except when in use.

Can you use some posters? Still have left-over yellow on green TRUTH IS BEAUTY, also some black on white LEARNING=EARNING.

JJ McH

(A frivolous attitude and levity of tone towards attendance taking are unsuitable to the high seriousness of our profession.)

JJ McH

INTRASCHOOL COMMUNICATION

FROM: 304

TO: 508

Dear Bea—

Fired by my visit to your classes, I asked Dr. Bester if I might observe other English teachers, to learn more about techniques. Stony silence. I guess no one else is willing to be seen. (I was particularly eager to discover how Henrietta teaches Punctuation Traffic. I understand she uses a system of signals such as Stop, Go, Curves Ahead. . . .)

Had another run-in with J.J. McH., in connection with my levity. But I've got to hold on to my sense of humor—which is really a sense of proportion.

"You and Mrs. Schachter are the only teachers with humors in the entire school," a student said to me. "You see the funny sides, which makes it easier."

It makes it much easier. How can I take seriously such mimeographed absurdities as "Lateness due to absence," "High under-achiever," and "Polio Consent slips'?

Syl

INTRASCHOOL COMMUNICATION

FROM: 508

TO: 304

Dear Syl,

I’ll match yours any day with: "Please disregard the following."

Bea

FROM: JAMES J. MCHABE, ADM. ASST.