for my first (un)enthusiastic ones

for my first (un)enthusiastic ones

Red pens, coffee filters, and a video
From the local renting whichamacallit
I sit down to plan
Or talk and stand.
5:12 A. M. has become alarming.
shaky morning showers,
while my past becomes less harming.
I've grown up.
Saying things now that I'd mocked then,
explaining the works of dead white men.
I keep wondering what they're thinking
And worrying.
Finding life in what value their youth assigns,
Because they assign me tasks too,
Like not staying up past my new bedtime with that girl,
Or my weekly exercise project,
Or responsibility.


[wrote this poem when I first started teaching; funny to think back on it now]