chapter VIII

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— daylight !chapter eight ; a barbaric yawp!

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daylight !
chapter eight ; a barbaric yawp!

"TO CHRIS," Knox started his poem in front of the entire class

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"TO CHRIS," Knox started his poem in front of the entire class. Some started to whisper, wondering who Chris was. The Dead Poets knew who she was. We knew.

Some of us smiled to each other, knowing this was going to be some lovesick poem, talking about Chris' golden hair, or deep eyes. Something along the lines of that.

"I see a sweetness in her smile. Bright light shines from her eyes. But life is complete. Contentment is mine just knowing that..."

Some boys started to snicker, and Knox struggled slightly to continue. Hopkins started chuckling.

"...Just knowing that she's alive." Knox scrunched up his paper, embarrassed and regretful of his poem. "Sorry, captain, it's stupid."

Keating jumped off his desk, walking forward. "No, no, it's not stupid. It's a good effort. It touched on one of the major themes: love. A major theme not only in poetry, but in life. Mr. Hopkins, you we're laughing. You're up."

Slowly, Hopkins stood, unfolding a sheet of paper in his hand. He made his way to the front of the classroom and sighed. "The cat sat on the mat."

Much of the class laughed, but I just rolled my eyes. Hopkins walked backed to his seat, winking at one of the girls.

"Congratulation, Mr. Hopkins," Mr. Keating said. "You have the first poem to ever have a negative score on the Pritchard scale."

Again, the class chuckled at Keating's response. Hopkins nodded, holding in his own laughter.

"We're not laughing at you, we're laughing near you," Mr. Keating said. "I don't mind that your poem had a simple theme. Sometimes the most beautiful poetry can be about simple things like a cat, or a flower, or rain. You see, poetry can come from anything with the stuff of revelation in it. Just don't let your poems be ordinary."

✔︎ DAYLIGHT, neil perryWhere stories live. Discover now