I am writing this first Scoop column of the school year at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, on the heels of welcoming students and their parents for the first day of school. The sentiment outside at the front circle was overwhelming and consistent: after a summer that was for some too quick, for some disjointed, and for some perfect, we are all so glad to be back.
That same feeling is strong inside the Schoolhouse as well. The faculty have been hard at work readying themselves for this first day for some time now. We marvel at how one group of students—first graders are suddenly second graders!—seems to transform in an instant and are ready to take on a new set of challenges. Our expert faculty stand ready, waiting for their newest charges to arrive at their doors.
This special moment, spent at the doorstep of challenge and change, has me thinking about the journey ahead. How do we approach another year of learning and leadership at Belmont Day? I shared a poem with the faculty by one of my favorite poets, Mary Oliver, to honor the journey each of our students will take this year. Then, this morning, I discovered a quote left for me by a colleague (thanks, Mrs. Armstrong!) from Rainer Maria Rilke that provokes the same inspiration.
These words provide an excellent frame to view the school year. I hope they inspire you as they have inspired me.
Welcome back, Belmont Day. It’s good to be home.
—–
Mysteries, Yes
by Mary Oliver
Truly, we live with mysteries too marvelous
to be understood.
How grass can be nourishing in the
mouths of the lambs.
How rivers and stones are forever
in allegiance with gravity
while we ourselves dream of rising.
How two hands touch and the bonds will
never be broken.
How people come, from delight or the
scars of damage,
to the comfort of a poem.
Let me keep my distance, always, from those
who think they have the answers.
Let me keep company always with those who say
“Look!” and laugh in astonishment,
and bow their heads.
———-
From: Letters to a Young Poet
by Rainer Maria Rilke
Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart
and to try to love the questions themselves
like locked rooms and like books that are written
in a very foreign tongue.
Do not now seek the answers,
which cannot be given you
because you would not be able to live them.
And the point is, to live everything.
Live the questions now.
Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it,
live along some distant day
into the answer.
