Previous Challenge Entry (Level 4 – Masters)
Topic: ARROW (11/17/22)
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TITLE: Choose the Song | Previous Challenge Entry
By Marilyn Borga
11/22/22 -
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Miss Keebler adjusted her wire-rimmed glasses and steeled her shoulders as she observed the restless eighth-graders before her. She had only a few weeks to whip us into shape for the stellar performance she expected at our graduation ceremony. The entire class was to perform a song for an audience of friends and family.
She herded us onto the creaking bleachers, separating the boys from the girls and arranging us by height. “See that you remember your places!” she barked over the thundering shuffling of feet.
Her fierce frown stilled us, and we stood at attention. She had chosen a musical rendition of the poem The Arrow and the Song by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.* As though hypnotized, we listened as she sang in a trill soprano:
I shot an arrow into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For, so swiftly it flew, the sight
Could not follow it in its flight.
I breathed a song into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For who has sight so keen and strong,
That it can follow the flight of song?
Long, long afterward, in an oak
I found the arrow, still unbroke;
And the song, from beginning to end,
I found again in the heart of a friend.
Miss Keebler tapped her wooden baton sharply on the desk in front of her, signaling it was our turn. Judging by the look on her face, the first stanza we tackled must have fallen painfully short. The boys, hesitant to project their squeaky, unreliable voices, were drowned out by the volume of the girls’ thin sopranos. But she tirelessly urged the boys to sing more courageously. She lectured on tone, cadence, and posture. “And open your mouths wide!” she admonished. Day by day, she mercilessly drilled us toward perfection.
Nearly sixty years later, the song is still with me: the melody, the lyrics, and the timing of each pause and breath are etched in my mind.
As an adult, I understand the symbolism in that beloved poem. I can see how it illustrates that our conduct has consequences that we may not realize until it’s too late. Whatever we say and do may, like an arrow, pierce and harm. Or, like a sweet song, our words and actions could go on to bless others.
I don’t remember whether or not Miss Keebler explained all of this to us. But I can understand why she chose this poem. We were living in a tumultuous time. We had recently witnessed the assassination of our president. The specter of nuclear war hovered over the world. Our politicians had pledged to fight against the threat of Communism. Riots over race and civil rights were exploding across the country. The United States was poised to soon enter into the Vietnam crisis in earnest.
Our teacher’s influence over us was coming to an end. She was determined to prepare us for the challenges of high school and, more importantly, for what might come afterward. We must work hard to survive in our dangerous and uncertain world. She hoped that we would choose kindness over hatred, good over evil. She hoped that we would choose the song.
One thing I remember about our eighth-grade graduation ceremony is that, as we finished our flawless presentation of The Arrow and the Song, Miss Keebler’s smile quivered slightly. In the reflection of the overhead lights, I saw a lone tear slide down her cheek. I knew then that it was not selfish ambition that made her insist that we strive to reach our potential. I sensed that all of her harsh primness was merely a facade. Beneath that stern exterior lurked a tender heart. Our strict, no-nonsense teacher cared deeply about her students.
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Let us think of ways to motivate one another to acts of love and good works.
Hebrews 10: 24 (NLT)
*Longfellow’s The Arrow and the Song, written in 1845, is in the public domain.
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