When I heard Gurdonark’s ‘Kindergarten’ I remembered a day that I took my then 4 year old daughter to kindergarten (20 years ago!) and I remembered a poem I wrote called ‘Kindergarten’ (published in my 2003 collection ‘Shadow Selves’.

Thanks also to morgantj for 4-year-old son laughing (Freesound) and adam danz for the sounds of children playing (Freesound).

KINDERGARTEN


She follows her mother
Along the fence.

Laughing,
They kiss through bars
Count three spaces
Kiss again
Count three spaces
Kiss again

All the way to the boundary
She prepares for the break
Bends, and silently plucks
A flower of palest yellow.

Her kindergarten friends
Look on; their voices call her away
But she does not respond to them
As she places the flower
In her mother’s hands
In her mother’s care

The other side of bars
mother walks away

(c) Deb Matthews-Zott