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1st Grade With Miss Harvison At Thatcher Elementary
1st Grade With Miss Harvison at Thatcher Elementary
David Walker
I
Miss Harvison’s smile greeted each taker of
An assigned seat of big kids desks
in our very first First Grade class
at Thatcher Elementary
It was early in September after a
Long summer and a
Successful year of half-day kindergarten
The beginning of numbered grades
All in a row
12 years was my first glimpse of forever
II
Miss Harvison was no taller than the
Tallest boys among us
And I was proudly one among them
Gray hair and pale blue eyes
Thin with the skin of an aging angel
She made learning fun
She made us want to come
For another chapter of Dick & Jane
And adding numbers
III
Miss Harvison never married
But by 1960 knew 50 years of children
She was 25 when she first arrived
And had her first 30 in a
Baptism of fire
She knew everyone
by name and by heart
It was the start of a life-long
love affair with teaching and learning
IV
Miss Harvison has always lived in the
Memories of a thousand and a half
Half-pints seated in neat rows
The children who became her students
Her treasures
Her measures of a meaningful life
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