---

punctuate much of my life,

as quiet as it’s been,

with many moments moored in education,

the

!

of getting a full scholarship from Wellesley,

the

!

of conversations with faculty,

Schwaber, Aswell, Prettyman, Craig, Berkman, Lever,

helping me hear myself

though I was often only whispering to them,

not sure my thinking good enough.

The

!

of summer school at Saint Paul’s, glimpsing possibly a life

in education, interning for a master teacher,

revisiting Eliot and Roethke, the teacher truly learning.

The

!

of the blue notepad sheets

torn from Elliot Coleman’s comment pad,

that year at Hopkins, writing poetry,

reading my mentor’s responses to my poems,

elliptically illuminating,

helping me stare at my words,

becoming unafraid I’d freeze if they stared back at me,

bolder in imagining how I might sound,

a bit unhinged, a bit unfettered,

in fact, just a bit unbalanced, letting language

help me to my feet.

---

Barbara Simmons grew up in Boston, resides in California –both coasts inform her poetry. A graduate of Wellesley College, she received an MA in The Writing Seminars from Johns Hopkins, and an MA in Education and Counseling from Santa Clara University. A retired educator, she continues to savor life and language, exploring words as ways to remember, envision, celebrate, mourn, and try to understand. Publications have included Boston Accent, NewVerse News, Topical Poetry, DoubleSpeak, Soul-Lit, 300 Days of Sun, Capsule Stories – Summer Edition, Swimming, Journal of Expressive Writing, and her recently published book, Offertories: Exclamations and Disequilbriums, Friesen Press.