Introduction & Overview of For Jennifer, 6, on The Teton by Richard Hugo

For Jennifer, 6, on The Teton Introduction

"For Jennifer, 6, on the Teton" is included in Richard Hugo's 1975 collection, What Thou Lovest Well, Remains American, which was nominated for the National Book Award and reprinted in Making Certain It Goes On: The Collected Poems of Richard Hugo (1983). Hugo often wrote poems to lovers, students, and sometimes children of friends and lovers, and this is one of the latter. Hugo addresses the child, Jennifer, throughout the poem, making comparisons between her life and the Teton River, which inspired the poem. Historically, poets have used the river as a symbol of time, life, and change, and Hugo draws on this tradition in the poem. The form of the poem, though not a letter, has much in common with the poems in Hugo's next collection, 31 Letters and 13 Dreams (1977), many of which he addresses to friends and acquaintances.

In five stanzas, the speaker, acting as...
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