Hello families,
Please join me in congratulating Isaac Mendez for winning first place in the Great Hearts Bard Competition! It was a wonderful event, and it filled my soul to see so many young men and women from around the valley expressing their hearts through beautiful poems and classic speeches. Isaac’s recitation of “Art vs. Trade” by James Weldon Johnson was superb, and as a result of his talent and hard work, he will be representing all Great Hearts as the 2022 Bard in the year ahead. We are all so proud of the dedication he poured into his performance!
You can see the replay of the Bard Competition in the link below:
The poem he chose is also a fitting reminder of the power of the liberal arts and the value of art and beauty as compared with our culture’s emphasis on pragmatism and mere moneymaking. Please see the poem below for your enjoyment and reflection:
Trade, Trade versus Art,
Brain, Brain versus Heart;
Oh, the earthiness of these hard-hearted times,
When clinking dollars, and jingling dimes,
Drown all the finer music of the soul.
Life as an Octopus with but this creed,
That all the world was made to serve his greed;
Trade has spread out his mighty myriad claw,
And drawn into his foul polluted maw,
The brightest and the best,
Well nigh,
Has he drained dry,
The sacred fount of Truth;
And if, forsooth,
He has left yet some struggling streams from it to go,
He has contaminated so their flow,
That Truth, scarce is it true.
Poor Art with struggling gasp,
Lies strangled, dying in his mighty grasp;
He locks his grimy fingers ’bout her snowy throat so tender.
Is there no power to rescue her, protect, defend her?
Shall Art be left to perish?
Shall all the images her shrines cherish
Be left to this iconoclast, to vulgar Trade?
Oh, that mankind had less of Brain and more of Heart,
Oh, that the world had less of Trade and more of Art;
Then would there be less grinding down the poor,
Then would men learn to love each other more;
For Trade stalks like a giant through the land,
Bearing aloft the rich in his high hand,
While down beneath his mighty ponderous tread,
He crushes those who cry for daily bread.
Congratulations again to Isaac and his family!
With Devotion,
Stephen Philabaum
Headmaster
Archway Trivium East
