"I am writing in response to the front page article of March 8, Where are the male teachers? I am a high school teacher who loves my subject, school, students and colleagues, but I find the headline Women are increasingly dominating profession a no-brainer.

Women have always dominated teaching; historically, it has been one of two socially-acceptable occupations to hold outside the home (guess what the other one is).

Why are there so few men in teaching? Simple, the profession lacks two important indicators of success: monetary reward and prestige. In a culture which socializes men to be aggressive and competitive and women to be passive and co-operative, is it any wonder men are staying away from the profession in droves?

In my 10 years of teaching the profession has been systematically attacked and demoralized on an ongoing basis. What man would willingly choose such a low-status job that incurs neither power nor rewards, financial, social or otherwise, over a job in business where even a mediocre worker gets more regular perks, bonuses and accolades than a master teacher?

Again, the answer is simple: a man not driven by the external rewards or public gratification deemed culturally valuable by our society. Coincidentally, I have the pleasure of working with such men who are driven, like their female counterparts, more by altruism than money.

A far better question would be, in a female-dominated profession such as teaching, why is it that all upper-level positions (department headships, senior high jobs, administration) are mostly held by men (ditto nursing)? Another consideration: why is there no other internal mechanism for recognizing teacher accomplishment besides promotion to administrative positions?

Teaching is largely an isolated occupation with virtually no feedback (except in the case of problems), power, financial reward or thank-yous.

There is a saying that goes, 'Those who plant trees have hope for the future.' The only way teachers survive such a delayed-gratification vocation is our knowledge that someday, after we are long gone, a tree we planted will very privately bear the fruits of our labour."

Kimberly Rokala

The War Bride

I lay awake last night and dreamed of her
One heart still beating by the lonely Somme
She wears these scars to remember the battles
Only those she lost, never those she won.

Her hair is black like a murder of crows
A liquor of ravens or a paper of pins
Please wake her before her cover blows
And her squadron of heroes comes running in.

Her father has made her wash for him
Every night since her coming of age
His vision soaks her body and his eyes
Cut like a thousand obsidian blades

She sings him to his gentle sleep
Selects one blade from the length of her arm
She watches the water still and deep
And leaves his body on the banks of the Marne.

I love her pale skin against my arm
The thrust of her back and her desperate rage
Her Passchendaele cross, her echo of Christ
And her hundred thousand obsidian blades

My head on her shoulder like a murderer knows
A disorder of conscience, a concubine's guilt
I wake her, she rises soft and she goes
To the house her holy soldier built