Jessie Fauset, "After School" (1920)
"I wish there'd be no school today."
And while the rest are at their books,
I give the teacher horrid looks,—
And think, "The minute school is over,
I'll race and romp with Ted Moore's Rover."
No matter what the teacher's saying,
My mind is off somewhere else playing.
But don't you know when Home-time comes,
I think, "I'll stay and work my sums.
I'll do 'four times four' on the board,
Or write how much wood makes a cord."
And Billy Hughes is just like me,
He stays back just as regularly!
He's always hunting out strange places
Upon the globe, and then he traces
A map with towns and states and mountains,
And public parks with trees and fountains!
And this is what's so queer to me—
Bill just can't get geography
In school-time, and I'm awful dumb,
I cannot do one single sum.
But just let that old teacher go—
There's nothing Bill and me don't know!
Published in The Brownies' Book, January 1920