When I was a young instructor, and all my world was young,

When teaching was excitement, and my songs still unsung,

When I was a young man, before I got in debt,

When household nor heartbreak nor tax were mine yet,

John Ciardi, Harry Hayford, Dick Beal, Bill

Shepard, Mike Rossman, Morrie Shirley, Don Jones

Gathered round and gladdened me by being young, too,

And doing all the crazy things that young men do.

They sat up late, they wrote well, ate, drank, jeered,

And so I believed a world might get somewhere, steered

By John Ciardi, Harry Hayford, Dick Beal, Bill

Shepard, Mike Rossman, Morrie Shirley, Don Jones.

I looked in all the papers, turned the radio on,

Wrote a thousand letters to where I guessed they'd gone,

Told a man at the corner store a certain simple word,

Asked everyone I met around to tell me what they heard

Of John Ciardi, Harry Hayford, Dick Beal, Bill

Shepard, Mike Rossman, Morrie Shirley, Don Jones.

The postman rang twice, and all the networks said

That though some citizens were dying or were dead,

And others had not written a good book or two,

Or married, or begotten, none of this was true

Of John Ciardi, Harry Hayford, Dick Beal, Bill

Shepard, Mike Rossman, Morrie Shirley, Don Jones.

One is in the Navy, and four are soldiers now,

Two of them are officers, and one behind a plow.

Five of them are married, one has written a book,

Three of them have children, and they let me take a look.

Hey! John Ciardi, Harry Hayford, Dick Beal, Bill

Shepard, Mike Rossman, Morrie Shirley, Don Jones.

Seven of them were freshmen once, three are now M.A.'s,

Two of them were business men, one of them got a raise.

From Florida to Michigan they juggle arithmetic

So fast it takes my breath away-I have to look quick

For John Ciardi, Harry Hayford, Dick Beal, Bill

Shepard, Mike Rossman, Morrie Shirley, Don Jones.

I'm older now, and all of them are getting older, too,

Busy with all the good things that older young men do,

And now who's talking about heartbreak, and debt,

And household, and taxes, that once were not theirs yet!

John Ciardi, Harry Hayford, Dick Beal, Bill

Shepard, Mike Rossman, Morrie Shirley, Don Jones,

Sandy Flandreau, Ken Van Auken, Bernie Glaser, Lew

Manly, George Spelvin, Clifton Fadiman, Charlie

McCarthy, Walt Whitman, and the gremlins, and me.