Lyric Poem · Poems About Mom
First Call
Whatever news the day brings in,
the triumph or the squall,
my thumb already knows the way:
you're always my first call.
You picked up through my growing pains,
you'll pick up when I'm gray;
whatever else my life becomes,
you're one ring away.
Original poem © QuillOak — personal sharing is permitted.
“First Call” by The QuillOak Editors — quilloak.com/poems/one-ring-away
Quick facts
- Poem
- First Call
- Poet
- The QuillOak Editors
- Length
- 8 lines
- Form
- Lyric Poem, Rhyming Poems
- Themes
- Poems About Mom, Family, Love
Craft notes
How this poem works
Measured from the text on this page, not copied from a summary. Counts are approximate: syllables and rhymes come from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, which models General American English, so dialect, older pronunciation, and performance can all change what you hear.
- Shape
- 8 lines · 2 quatrains
- Line length
- Lines run 5-8 syllables (median 8), consistent with tetrameter. No single length dominates, which is normal once elision and contraction are in play.
Want the rules this form is measured against? Read what makes a lyric poem, or run your own draft through the form checker to see the same measurements on your lines. How we measure · Report a mistake
Text, source & rights
A traceable edition
Original QuillOak text. Personal sharing is permitted; other reuse requires permission.
- Author record
- The QuillOak Editorstoday
- Source record
- QuillOak originalFirst Call, authored for QuillOak by The Quillery
- Display decision
- Full text · United States · reviewed 2026-07-18
- Publication record
- Not recorded in the imported source
- Text fingerprint
- SHA-256 d226d62422dcbd0f…
- Editorial handling
- Whitespace and stanza breaks normalized for web display; no material wording change recorded.
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