Hello, darkness my old friend. A Graaff-Reinet teacher re-wrote ‘Sound of Silence’ with a Loadshedding theme!
Graaff-Reinet, South Africa (22 September 2022) – Despite the “Sound of Silence” thanks to loadshedding… this teacher is bringing us some laughs.
Bronwen Langmead, a teacher at Union High School in Graaff-Reinet, wrote a hilarious parody poem while marking matric exam papers in the dark due to loadshedding.
The poem follows the same composition as The Sound of Silence, the song originally written by Simon & Garfunkle.
Langmead says that “this is what happens when you have to mark Life Orientation in the dark”.
Read it below:
Hello darkness my old friend
I have to mark with you again,
Because a deadline softly speaking
Just will not happen while I am sleeping,
And the deadline
In my stressed-out teacher brain,
Still remains…
Despite the sounds
Of silence.
Through restless halls I pace alone
Wishing that I had a clone,
Beside the pile of never- ending scripts
I cuss Eskom’s continued use-less-ness.
And my eyes are struck by the lack of a neon light
That takes the night,
Despite the sounds
Of silence.
And in the lack of light I saw
Ten thousand papers maybe more
Learners writing without thinking
A teacher proscrastin-ating
A teacher writing poems
In the darkness of her home…
Due to the sounds
Of silence.
Yes, loadshedding is terrible and inconveniences us all, but South Africans have a way of laughing through tragic situations while collectively helping each other get through them.
So here’s a little bit of help (and some great loadshedding tips) from our very own Suzelle DIY!
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