Review: "Teaching Metaphors" by Nathan Graziano

This latest collection of poetry by Manchester teacher Nathan Graziano, captures the two sides of the desk in high school: the student life and the faculty life. Graziano sees his students wading through endless days of monotony, low self-esteem, and churning hormones. The classes are dull and uninteresting to them and the students are spectacularly cruel to one another. But, though there is exclusion and leering, there are also unexpected acts of tenderness and vulnerablility that they reveal to him. But its not only the student body that deserves deeper reflection - the faculty get equal examination through his poetic eye: the old alcoholic, the overstressed teacher at the copy machine, and the sad and angry woman, whom he simply calls "Head Case."

The poems all have a thin current of humor, even the darker ones, and though there is stereotyping, it is done only out of celebration of our human differences, never out of judgement or ridicule. Graziano writes with great affection toward his students and fellow faculty members. His prose style closely mirrors poets like Louise Gluck or Mark Strand, and pins little Post-Its of everyday high school life to our eyes, so much so, that we again can see our own high school days reflected through his sharp observations. The homecoming queen, the stoner, the jock, the goth kid - they're all here.

This material, in another writers' hands, would come off as cliche and unoriginal, and maybe a little mean, but Graziano deftly weaves wit and genuine heart into each poem, though there are a few weak moments ("Finally Polonius" never really lands where it should).

Graziano wrote this collection while in his 10th year as a high school English teacher at Pembroke Academy and says, "When I entered this profession in 1997, I told myself I'd teach for five years, and five years at the most. I had big plans for my life. Enormous plans." That, ultimately, is the story that Teaching Metaphors tells: the dreams of students, the dreams of their parents, the dreams of the faculty for themselves and also for their students. Reading this collection, also allows us as the audience to resurrect those memories, whether painful or joyful, of our own high school experience. Whether the dreams we had back then have yet to be fulfilled, we can at least walk the halls with his students and gratefully mutter, "I survived."

TEACHING METAPHORS
Nathan Graziano

I stood, a concrete form,

in front of twenty-five adolescents.

They were stunned by boredom,

watching the second hand

on the wall clock

and drawing caricatures
of me in their notebooks.

I forged on and explained
that metaphors

are the beautiful women

in the Language Lounge,

their long legs
crossed at the ankles.

Implied metaphors

blow kisses and flirt

with their eyes.

Extended metaphors

sweat in the sheets,

payment for sticking around

for the entire poem.

And sexual metaphors

need to be avoided at all costs.

A boy in the back began to snore.

A week later, when I asked

for an example of a metaphor,

the same boy said,

"Fuck you. I hate this class."

Abstractions aren't for everyone.