Celebrating a Teacher
We met as she introduced
seven and eight year olds
To the process of learning
to be themselves.
Two classes, one room,
special tasks for each of us.
Mine: read a book a week
and tell her why I liked it.
She was twenty-three.
Later, in her eighties, she
Put an ad in the local paper
and contacted many of us.
Her own life
was far from easy,
Yet still she checked
to see how we were doing.
Three years ago
I sent her some poems
And she sent back a thoughtful,
hand-written critique .
Last year my Christmas card
got none in return
And I learned today that she
passed away at ninety-two.
History, we’re too often told,
is facts and events.
But our personal one
is so much a product
Of how we learn to learn
and how we are taught.
It’s no accident that
my fourth-grade year
Remains one of the most vivid
of a lifetime,
And that my personal pantheon
maintains a special place for
Martha Heap Pedroza,
my teacher.
Charles B. Neff
12/13/11
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