End of Semester Rush

It’s the end of the semester, and you’re just about ready to start pulling your hair out. There are finals and papers and books to read and you can’t sleep at night because you’re so worried and you have no social life because you lock yourself away in your room trying to study and… phew! Well, there’s a lot to be done still, even with just a few days left. Just remember! – tutoring is still available for last minute checks! 

Easy reading

"Easy reading is damn hard writing."

-Nathaniel Hawthorne

Polytechnic NaNoWriMo Poems

Oh writer, how come

you think we proofread your work?

Learn punctuation.

-Amy

Your assignment is

due tomorrow? Want an ‘A’?

I am not a god.

-Amy

I don’t edit things,

my name isn’t spellcheck. So,

let’s work together.

-Cody

Two sentences. No,

commas don’t go in between.

That’s a comma splice.

-Cody

Oh my god, Amy,

you are killing me slowly;

Haikus are poison.

-Amy, from Cody’s perspective

“Corrections. Corrections, that’s all I need.”

Let me look over your paper and see…

Hint, questions, do you see it?

A missing article, a period, I see it!

You’re growing! I helped, see what can happen when we work as a team!

-Brittany

Pencil and paper meet,

The rest is simply history.

-Brittany

A computer can type it,

A tape recorder can replay it.

A memory can promise to keep it,

But only pencil and pen,

Writer and idea can consume it.

The imagination and creativity all play a

Role in the world we invent behind the

Eyes everyone sees, when they fall back

And your heart dreams.

-Brittany

Writing in 100 Years

The mechanization of the imagination –

Programmed creativity.

So reliant on the system, the machine, the robotic (superior, of course) life.

Humanity can no longer think a thought

Or write a word

Without first asking:  “Is this popular on Twitter?”

--Alyssa, West writing tutor

Wise Words

writing in 100 years

After the apocalypse

which I rather look forward to

I will scratch words onto concrete

and into trunks of tiny saplings trembling toward the sun,

doing writing, life, and writing life

over. 

Wondering Robots

“Imagine,” a woman says.

“People used to have to write by hand

Their own thoughts

Before there were mind-scanning robots.”

The little girl stares,

Incredulous.

“But how?” she wonders.

Writing Breakdown: A Couplet

Excuse me, friend, but where is your introduction?

It needs to be there for your reader’s consumption.

Don’t forget your thesis and logical progression.

You want to make a good first impression.

Did you proofread this draft at any point on your own?

Try reading it out loud in the comfort of your home.

Last but not least, try not to forget

That with a little effort and help, an A you will surely get!

Ode to McCarthy

A class I had tonight to teach,

About one who tends to the peach

Oh, Cormac McCarthy

You’ve stolen my heart, see,

In The Orchard you promised to Keep

--Nicole, West writing tutor