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Column 230

First Grade

Intro by Ted Kooser
08.16.2009

It’s been six­ty-odd years since I was in the ele­men­tary grades, but I clear­ly remem­ber those first school days in ear­ly autumn, when sum­mer was sud­den­ly over and we were all perched in our lit­tle desks fac­ing into the future. Here Ron Koertge of Cal­i­for­nia gives us a glimpse of a day like that. 

First Grade

Until then, every forest
had wolves in it, we thought
it would be fun to wear snowshoes
all the time, and we could talk to water.
 
So who is this woman with the gray
breath calling out names and pointing
to the little desks we will occupy
for the rest of our lives?

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Disclaimer

We do not accept unsolicited submissions

We do not accept unsolicited submissions. American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2008 by Ron Koertge, whose most recent book of poems is Fever, Red Hen Press, 2006. Reprinted by permission of Ron Koertge. Introduction copyright © 2024 by The Poetry Foundation.