and once again, it's Monday morning
First Reader by Billy Collins I can see them standing politely on the wide pages that I was still learning to turn, Jane in a blue jumper, Dick with his crayon-brown hair, playing with a ball or exploring the cosmos of the backyard, unaware they are the first characters, the boy and the girl who begin fiction. Beyond the simple illustration of their neighborhood the other protagonists were waiting in a huddle: frightening Heathcliff, frightened Pip, Nick Adams carrying a fishing rod, Emma Bovary riding into Rouen. But I would read about the perfect boy and his sister even before I would read about Adam and Eve, garden and gate, and before I heard the name Gutenberg, the type of their simple talk was moving into my focusing eyes. It was always Saturday and he and she were always pointing at something and shouting “Look!” pointing at the dog, the bicycle, or at their father as he pushed a hand mower over the lawn, waving at aproned Mother framed in the kitchen doorway, pointing toward th...