Sugar - Charlie Dalton

7

The next day Clara excitedly made her way to Mr. Keating's room, wondering what the class would be doing today.

Sitting down, Clara shot Todd a smile before their professor began his lesson.

"Lady and gentlemen, open your text to page twenty-one of the introduction. Mr. Perry, will you read the opening paragraph of the preface, entitled Understanding Poetry?"

Clara turned to face her brother with a smirk, as he pulled out his reading glasses.

"Understanding Poetry, by Dr. J. Evans Pritchard, Ph.D. To fully understand poetry, we must first be fluent with its meter, rhyme, and figures of speech. Then ask two questions: One, how artfully has the objective of the poem been rendered, and two, how important is that objective. Question one rates the poem's perfection, question two rates its importance. And once these questions have been answered, determining a poem's greatest becomes a relatively simple matter."

Immediately the girls hopeful mood for the class dropped. They were seriously going to be scaling literature on a mathematic slope?

She turned back to the board, and watched Keating draw a graph and slowly become just like the rest of the teachers here. Boring.

Nonetheless, Neil continued. "If the poem's score for perfection is plotted along the horizontal of a graph, and its importance is plotted on the vertical, then calculating the total area of the poem yields the measure of its greatness."

Solemnly, Clara began to draw the graph herself, catching eyes with Charlie as she turned around to get something out of her bag.

She fake choked herself, getting a smile out of the boy.

She smiled triumphantly, at least he hadn't just ignored the joke because they were in class. Although he didn't seem like the type to care about 'good' behavior in class.

"A sonnet by Byron may score high on the vertical, but only average on the horizontal. A Shakespearean sonnet, on the other hand, would score high both horizontally and vertically, yielding a massive total area, thereby revealing the poem to be truly great. As you proceed through the poetry in this book, practice this rating method. As your ability to evaluate poems in this matter grows, so will - so will your enjoyment and understanding of poetry."

Neil finished, and quickly shoved his glasses away. That made the girl giggled quietly.

With a smile, Mr. Keating turned around. "Excrement. That's what I think of Mr. J. Evans Pritchard. We're not laying pipe, we're talking about poetry!"

Clara almost let out a sigh of reliefs when hearing the teachers word. Thanks gosh!

"I mean, how can you describe poetry like American Bandstand? I like Byron, I give him a 42, but I can't dance to it. And now, I want you to rip out that page."

Multiple students around began to whisper and share glances with each other. Even Clara, who liked this outwardly way of teaching, thought this order was odd.

"Go on, rip out the entire page. You heard me, rip it out. Rip it out!" Keating urged. "Go on, rip it out."

Suddenly Clara heard the first rip. Turning around, she saw Charlie holding up the textbook page with his usual smirk.

Immediately after Clara did the same, sending a wink to the boy.

"Thank you Mr. Dalton, Miss Perry. Gentlemen and lady, tell you what, don't just tear out that page, tear out the entire introduction. I want it gone, history. Leave nothing of it. Rip it out. Rip! Begone J. Evans Pritchard, Ph.D. Rip, shred, tear. Rip it out. I want to hear nothing but ripping of Mr. Pritchard."

The girl turned to her side to see Meeks contemplating on what to do.

"Come on Meeks," she smiled and shoved him arm, "it won't kill you."

Meeks looked at the girl and sighed, reluctantly tearing out pages.

"We'll perforate it, put it on a roll." Mr. Keating explained. "It's not the Bible, you're not going to go to Hell for this. Go on, make a clean tear, I want nothing left of it.

"We shouldn't be doing this." Clara heard Cameron hiss to her brother.

"Rip, rip, rip!"

The class turned to a commotion, with papers flying, tears all around, and everyone enjoying themselves. Something Clara believed to be very uncommon at Welton.

What the hell is going on here?" Mr. McAllister shouted, bursting into the room.

Everyone shot their heads back, quickly going silent. Clara watched Charlie shove a piece of paper in his mouth, making the girl hold back a laugh.

"I don't hear enough rips." Mr. Keating laughed as he came back into the classroom with a waste bin.

Clearly, Mr. McAllister didn't expect to see a teacher in the room. "Mr. Keating."

"Mr. McAllister."

"I'm sorry, I- I didn't know you were here."

"I am." The teacher smiled as McAllister shifted awkwardly in his shoes.

"Ahh, so you are. Excuse me."

As soon as he exited, Mr. Keating turned back around to the students. "Keep ripping. This is a battle, a war. And the casualties could be your hearts and souls."

Charlie spit the now wet paper into the waste bin. This made Clara outwardly laugh as the room began to gain back its noise.

"Thank you Mr. Dalton. Armies of academics going forward, measuring poetry. No, we will not have that here. No more of Mr. J. Evans Pritchard. Now in my class you will learn to think for yourselves again. You will learn to savor words and language. No matter what anybody tells you, words and ideas can change the world. I see that look in Mr. Pitt's eye, like nineteenth century literature has nothing to do with going to business school or medical school. Right? Maybe. Mr. Hopkins, you may agree with him, thinking 'Yes, we should simply study our Mr. Pritchard and learn our rhyme and meter and go quietly about the business of achieving other ambitions.' I have a little secret for ya. Huddle up. Huddle up!"

Quickly everyone centered around the teacher, Clara ending up next to Neil in the front.

"We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. Medicine, law, business, engineering, these are all noble pursuits, and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman: 'O me, o life of the questions of these recurring, of the endless trains of the faithless, of cities filled with the foolish. What good amid these, o me, o life? Answer: that you are here. That life exists, and identity. That the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse. That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse."

Neil smiled so brightly next to Clara, she thought she would need sunglasses.

But how impactful, not a single note was taken but the young girl knew she would remember this speech for the rest of his life.

Suddenly Keating looked up at Todd across from her. She had forgotten he was here due to the rowdiness of the rest of the class.

"What will your verse be?"