When Ernest Becker taught at Berkeley
My fellow student in the great lecture hall
Found him so compelling
He changed his major to philosophy.
The professor that immediately bound us was another
formerly tenured at Harvard,
denied Einstein’s seat at Princeton
because his truth was not in numbers,
baptized by television’s touch,
His hall of students would one day
Stand and applaud in appreciation of insight given,
I only saw the honor given once.
The great professor kept office hours
Which my friend would visit
He discovered that only the brilliant were welcome
Even an errant engineering major need not apply.
He was disappointed,
He yearned to be someone’s disciple.
Catherine Beck at little Geneseo
In a European history survey
Spent two weeks on Thomas More
Suspect it was an academic sin
Not the formula a great graduate seat to win.
I remember her well
Though by no means the best of her students
She cared enough about us to help at office hours
Gave guidance on the storms beyond her door.
Too stately for the streets
She made her statement in a more civil way
In a man five hundred years dead but alive for her
A not so little matter for a college kid
In the days when Viet Nam was a verb.
Bill Grace
http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/big-school-little-school/
