Ted Kooser is a two-time US Poet Laureate and the author of numerous poetry collections, including Delights & Shadows, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry; Splitting an Order; Kindest Regards; and Cotton Candy (2022). As Poet Laureate he created “American Life in Poetry,” a free weekly column for newspapers, featuring a poem by a contemporary American writer. Born in Ames, Iowa, Kooser is a former vice president of Lincoln Benefit Life, where he worked as an insurance representative for many years. He is Presidential Professor Emeritus at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln.

Photograph by Matt Valentine.

People We Will Never See Again

an iPoem

by Ted Kooser

Today, in a crowded doctor’s waiting room,
sat a sad little man of maybe fifty,
wearing a baggy black suit, a black shirt
buttoned to the neck, and black work shoes,

People on couch
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