first grades
Harvey S. Mozolak

elementary
schools have begun this custom
in recent years
that must attempt to teach
some positive value
large rocks
easily three feet wide
and several high
appoint the entrance
and exit driveways
where presumably parents
or artsy aunts and uncles
paint student names
outlined with butterflies fireworks
and other splashy colored
things around perhaps a month
and day that marks one assumes
the child’s birthday
a somewhat strange custom
as a practice perhaps
for the next time the letters
will be ground more permanent
in stone
and the next date far less celebrative
when the grading
will be deeply elemental