It somehow seemed appropriate to launch my yearly Head of School blog by celebrating the success of a very recent graduate.  The first week back to school, I was greeted by a very proud mother who had just learned that her son’s book of poetry was being published and picked up by Skylight bookstores.  Cameron Lange, a stellar graduate of our 2009 International Baccalaureate class, is a master of many things: at LILA he was an active participant in the sports leagues, playing on both the championship high school basketball team last year as well as on the adult student-teacher champion soccer team. He was also a big part of LILA’s music program, playing both in the school band and singing in the choir that sang the national anthem at the Staples Center to open a Clippers game last March.  Well, to his list of accomplishments we now get to add “published poet.” 

His mother explains that he started submitting poems online to the 10k Poet site.  The site, which has been running for almost two years, started to feature his poems (he has quite a following ... with people even leaving messages).  The site then developed an online magazine where Cameron was one of 10 poets featured and apparently got 40,000 hits.  They then started to stream online - a 1 1/2 hour weekly radio program, and they even asked Cameron to host a couple of times.   The guy running the site then decided he would start to publish and asked Cameron if he could publish him (There's no ISBN number as yet!)  

Once published, Cameron took his book to Skylight; they reviewed it, and have agreed to take it on. He is also in talks with two other independent bookstores in Los Angeles, and negotiations look hopeful.  

And, of course we wish Cameron the best for his university studies at York this year!

"Sometimes" (from his newly published book of poetry:  Chaotic Rhythm)

sometimes

the turbulence

gets so strong

I smile,

drop my illusion of control

halt the industry of my heart

encrypt the nuclear codes

give myself back

to a music

I had forgotten

to listen for