thebeardedpoet's review against another edition
2.0
These are mostly observation poems from the point of view of a school teacher. In a few instances, the experience uplifts and surprises with vivid sensory details, making for a very good poem. Some of these are: "Forgetting Dante in Third Period," "Tough Cookies," "Space Walk," "Taking the ACT in December," and "The Fifteen Dollar Vacation." In other cases, too many for my tastes, the poems are critiques of the students, commenting how reticent they are to engage with class material, how bored they are, and how hard it is to get their attention. I fully understand this is a common experience for school teachers, but it does not make for what I consider to be worthwhile poetry.
poeticallygrey's review against another edition
2.0
Ortolani captures the little moments that make up a teacher's experience in his stunted snapshot poems. The landscape offers a plethora of opportunities missed in this little chapbook. It suffers from being too mundane with nothing to draw the reader into the world.
ashlurtis's review
5.0
The vibe of this whole collection is so wholesome. For some reason, I really enjoyed the school setting. The majority of these poems are told from a teacher’s perspective both in and outside the classroom. It’s been quite a while since I was in a classroom, so the perspective was quite nice. The pieces are somewhat simple and easily digestible which I find to be an interesting contrast to some of the works that pop up in the poems: Kafka, Hawthorne, Chaucer. I also enjoyed the few poems that left the theme altogether. Overall, I think this is a wonderful bite-sized peek into the life of a teacher in a world where they are not exactly praised for what they do.
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