Early Wonder

“Stars for the First Time”

Sharing Stories
May 28, 2023 at 4:48 p.m.
At about the same time as the star poem, a photo of me holding Micky’s leash.
From left to right, my aunt Aun, Patricia Davis, my mother Pearl, sister Dorothy next to me, and sister Frances behind her.
At about the same time as the star poem, a photo of me holding Micky’s leash. From left to right, my aunt Aun, Patricia Davis, my mother Pearl, sister Dorothy next to me, and sister Frances behind her.

...by Patricia Davis

 “Stars for the First Time”

I had never seen the stars before,
until night gave me a dark ship
and I sailed to the sky
the night after sorrow.


Great white globes
in startling bright stillness,
hanging like lanterns
in a deep garden,
bedecking the sky.


Dewdrops patterned on spider webs,
catching the golden glint of the moon,
encircling the sky to the sides of my ship.
Then dropping far into the bottomless depths
of a black sleeping ocean.


Patricia Davis at 14, in 9th grade 1935


Patricia Evelyn Davis attended Roosevelt High School and the University of Washington to become a Seattle teacher herself.


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