All I’d Leave Behind ((3)) Poem by Yaritza Florencio

In the school where I spent six years of my life
The halls that I ran through
I see the six graders now and they look smaller than I remember them
And the teachers look more forgiving then,
I once believed them
I say hello to the most brutal teacher I remember
He loves math
He smiles when he sees me
“Florencio” he says
A bad habit of calling me by my last name
Not too soon forgotten
We speak for a while and strangely he seems nice now
Before when I reached only to his hip
He seemed much more imposing
Now that I’m almost his height
It’s different
“How has school been? ”
I remember he failed me once on a math test
It hurt, since I had proclaimed myself his favorite student
But I do remember something much more important than that
The single most important lesson that the excruciating subject of math has taught me
“Yes and how has your mother been”
At first I didn’t understand the lesson, but now I do
Life in itself is a one variable equation
The solution X must be found
You must add, subtract, and divide and sooner or later
After much trial and error you are left with one number
And that number is the solution
“Well I have a class, so I must say goodbye”
We say our farewells and he says a curious thing that stays with me
“Yaritza you should come by more often, Mt. V- has few prized students
It would be a shame too lose one so close by”
I smile he has never called me by my first name before
A teacher undeniably one of a kind
Someone else I refuse to leave behind …………