Ricardo Eliécer Neftalí Reyes Basoalto
Remember The Front Page News when Pinochet refused the Latin American masses in 1973?
Ms Flannery Did.
Maybe her humble protest?
Maybe a teachable moment?
It matters not.
Ms Flannery Simply Shared Her Own Pablo Poetry Love.
With Us.
3rd Graders,
Eager Worldly Learners.
Remember when the Chilean people ignored President Pinochet's nil public celebration decree?
They Marched, They Came In Massive Numbers, They Wanted To Farewell Their Hero.
So We Read.
To Celebrate A Poet.
On The Other Distant Side of The Pacific.
Remember when The 1971 Nobel Laureate, a peace prize winner, a diplomat, a worldly well read poet,
a communist, a radical, a man who had to hide in fear of death and/or arrest,
a man of strength and grace and a particularly challenging up bringing?
so what's in Pablo's changed name? why why why?
why did he choose "Pablo Neruda" as his writing non de plume?
why was a Poet, even in death, so despised and feared by President Pinochet in His Own Country?
Ms Flannery, Our 3rd Grade Teacher, simply stoked My Poetry Fire in 1973 and It Has Not Relented,
Yet.
Thank You Pablo, Even In Your Passing in 1973,
Thank You Ms Flannery, An Awesome Teacher (You Big Flower Power Radical Hippy!)
Thank You To The Poetry I Still Adore.
May Be Why I Became a teacher of High School English?
Maybe...
It matters not,
I felt It, It Is Real Learning, It Was In The News,
It was a teacher's own passion for poetry and protest and radical politics
to share a contemporary life in Pablo's death
that created a teachable biographical library research moment.
Pretty cool how that learning works...
and still does.
Has anyone you love changed their name?
I have...
