It’s been some months since our last election, but it is always good to be reminded, in this poem by Kamilah Aisha Moon, of how precious and hard-won the right to vote and the act of voting are.

 

1ST VOTE

by Kamilah Aisha Moon

It was hers.

She had this choice

behind curtained bliss,

Dad’s chest full on the other side

as her tapered hand

pulled the lever.

 

No matter how wide

the final margin,

a lone ballot

never counted so much.

 

American Life in Poetry is made possible by the Poetry Foundation, publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2002 by Kimiko Hahn, ‘Reckless Sonnet No 8’ from The Artist’s Daughter, (WW Norton & Company, 2002). Poem reprinted by permission of the author and the publisher. Introduction copyright ©2021 by the Poetry Foundation. The introduction’s author, Kwame Dawes, is George W Holmes Professor of English and Glenna Luschei editor of Prairie Schooner at the University of Nebraska