HAUSMAN: Clouds rolled in, and rain fell, cutting the afternoon short, but the students had written 53 haiku, saying a lot with a little.įor NPR News, I'm Sandy Hausman in Lexington, Virginia.Ĭopyright © 2012 NPR. , WASHINGTON & LEE UNIVERSITY: Definitely. , WASHINGTON & LEE UNIVERSITY: What I would say is appreciation of the other cultures and language that you have will move you to the front of the line when you're competing for other opportunities. Like other patrons, she gave five dollars to charity in exchange for the service, and left the students with some invaluable advice: Poetry might not seem like a job skill, but it could give graduates an edge. HAUSMAN: Beverly Lorig, Director of Career Services at Washington & Lee, wanted a poem for her mom. I'll bet this is the first Myrtle you've had today. It's fast but it also makes fastness slow, if that makes sense.īEVERLY LORIG: My mother's name is Myrtle. WHEELER: They require you to focus intensely on a moment and expand that moment. Professor Wheeler, hoping haiku duty would give her speed-happy students a chance to slow down, to think about mothers and other special people in their lives. HAUSMAN: This enterprise was an assignment. LESLEY WHEELER: What people are doing is they're photographing them on their cell phones and sending them that way. But English Professor Lesley Wheeler says no one had time for snail mail. One of them, a gifted calligrapher, put the poems on postcards.

HAUSMAN: The exercise seemed to come naturally for students who routinely text and tweet. Her favorite flowers are Stargazer lilies and that's why I included that in there. MICHELLE SZYMCZAK: A selfless teacher, beautiful and special, like Stargazer lilies. HAUSMAN: Michelle Szymczak was a bit more sentimental as she prepared a poem for her friend's mother - a special ed teacher who loves flowers. In a matter of minutes, student Aaron Jeong had woven those words into poetry. HAUSMAN: Right now she's getting into sewing. HAUSMAN: She started W&L's volleyball program. JEONG: OK, what does she like? what does she like to do, hobbies? The last is graduating from college this month. SCOTT DITMAN: We've been married 34 years.ĭITMAN: We have three kids - all of them grown. But University Registrar Scott Ditman was confident a small poem could hit big with the mother of his children. SANDY HAUSMAN, BYLINE: Fifteen students took turns at a long table outside the dining hall, notebooks and pens poised to honor mothers in that spare Japanese style.

She has set up a booth on campus to craft custom haiku.įrom member station WVTF, Sandy Hausman reports. Tomorrow is Mother's Day and a professor at Washington & Lee University in Lexington, Virginia has a gift idea.

Haiki saying