I couldn't resist penning this one. It's all true , based on my years as teacher, educator, and director of programs. Enjoy.
A Straight Face
By John Herlihy
Sometimes I find it difficult to keep a straight face,
So I feel like an adopted member of the human race.
Always expected to remain placid and professional,
To be calm in the face of the false and the sensational.
A case in point arises periodically with my weak students;
At the end of the semester, they come boldly to my office.
Their faces beaming with light without a trace of shame;
They ask me to change their grade with no sense of blame.
Then there was the case of the wanton female faculty member,
Who liked to skip classes when she was feeling a little tender.
I caught her red-handed eating a chicken wrap with her friend.
When confronted with her lie, she accused me to the bitter end.
What about my tennis partner, one of my best faculty members,
A computer geek who worked for Cisco and was an East-Ender.
It came to my attention that he falsified his educational degrees;
I had to summarily fire him when his lie fell apart at the seams.
Nor can I forget one teacher of mine, a Greek from New York City,
Who tried to undermine another faculty by anonymous e-mail.
Through a quirk of luck, I was able to trace the slander back to him.
When confronted with the perfidy, all he did was grimace, then grin.
I once worked closely at the university with the Provost.
As a benevolent teacher, I was expected to give the utmost.
One day, he asked me to pass one of the failing students,
With a wink and a nod, I was expected to see his prudence.
Finally, not to overlook the foppish Dean who didn’t have a clue,
Or his Associate Dean sidekick who could surely add nothing new.
Both wanted comments on false accusations in anonymous letters;
Both longed to tie me up in knots and in prison chain me in fetters.
The list could go on of people I had to confront for some reason,
Thru lies, cheating, slander, and treachery, a vice for any season.
In innocence, I was expected to be Mr. Good Guy and keep the faith,
To overlook the hypocrisy that life offers and maintain a straight face.
Postscript: I can no longer keep a straight face, it’s chuck full of wrinkles,
That passes as an aging parchment that now overshadows my dimples.
There are few things worse than enablers, be they of addictive behaviors or of rotten characters. As painful as they often are, I much prefer the honesty of those who genuinely care for me. As for the others, well, there's a short pithy, totally impossible suggestion as to what they can do to themselves that serves a good purpose.
Whether it be student, faculty member, or administrator, you are so right in calling them out when they violated the sacred trust of their position. I too, had similar situations. Revealing a ring of thieves stealing projects for grade in my college sophomore class; preventing my roommate in my sophomore class from copying my test answers by turning the pages rapidly so that he couldn't see them; and having to be faced with defending myself from an anonymous letter as well as other accusations that weren't true.
As the difficulty of achieving higher education and higher levels of attainment in both faculty and administration, some resort to despicable practice in trying to get ahead. Many, but not all, are caught by those like you or me. Now, as poets, we can reveal those hypocrisies in the hope that by doing so, others will not be tempted to.
Excellent examples of why you know can't keep a straight face! What people won't do! It's so much easier to remember the truth. Some people want to reap the rewards without running the course. 'Enjoyed!
Ah, keeping a straight face is like lying to ourselves. Even so there are times and you have delivered a few, it is just better to keep that stright face.
For one reason or another, I've had to do the same thing, and I've often wondered how many times somebody else had to keep a straight face looking at me.
(Self-published. Please contact author directly to order.)
Enter the pages of diaspora in quiet introspection. Bathe your thoughts with subtle humor; synchronize your spirit-sense with history-in-heat; fall headlong with eyes wide open into
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Rebecca
As the difficulty of achieving higher education and higher levels of attainment in both faculty and administration, some resort to despicable practice in trying to get ahead. Many, but not all, are caught by those like you or me. Now, as poets, we can reveal those hypocrisies in the hope that by doing so, others will not be tempted to.
Ron
Love ya!
Jane