Thank you, all.
I like to read at colleges and universities
a little poem, which arose from the fact
that I once went on a binge of reading
biographies and autobiographies of famous literary men.
And at the end of reading a whole slew of such books,
I was left with the impression that these famous literary men
had made the lives of their own children perfectly miserable.
Now at the same time, I thought that, obviously, I
remembered that these very same men had
served as parents to other people's children absolutely
beautifully.
That other people's children had learned from them,
had tested themselves against them.
The-- two of their books, the literary men
had taught the children, other people's children, what
they didn't want to know, had made
them face what they didn't want to face, as good parents do,
and so on.
And out of this paradox, out of this paradox
came a little poem called "Relationships."
"The legal children of a literary man
remember his ugly words to their mother.
He made them keep quiet and kissed them later.
He made them stop fighting and finish their supper.
His stink in the bathroom sickened their noses.
He left them with sitters in lonesome houses.
He mounted their mother and made them wear braces.
He fattened on fame and raised them thin.
But the secret son of the same man
sprang up like weeds from the seed of his word.
They eat from his hand.
And it is not hard.
They unravel his sweater and swing from his beard.
They smell in their sleep his ferns and roses.
They hunt the fox on his giant horses.
They slapped their mother, repeating his phrases.
And swell in his sight and suck him thin."
I like to read this at universities.
Because university people write term papers and dissertations
about these famous literary men's-- men and suck them
thin."