Thank you, Mrs. Shelton.
Ladies and gentlemen, I'm having trouble but I'll solve it,
I hope.
You should have come up here and put your arms around me.
Something keeps happening to this thing.
Oh, I'm trying to attach it in the wrong place.
I'll catch up with the 20th century sometime.
I think that has it.
Can you hear me?
It's pleasant to return to this particular series.
I think it's one of the great ones.
Somehow, Stephan has created an enduring sort of institution.
And I like it too because I don't
think a poet has to do a lot of yakking about the poem
to such an audience.
He can get on with it.
And I was talking to Mrs. Shelton,
and she suggested I start with some children's poems, which
I'm delighted to do because I've been having a binge of them
recently.
Poems I want to read tonight are all unpublished as yet.
But I finished the Divine Comedy in September or so.
And I finished a long book of autobiographical poems
I want to read some excerpts from.
And suddenly, I began to find myself compulsively
writing children's poems or some emotional shift I needed.
And I don't know that anybody wants to publish them.
They say I'm too rough on children.
But if you are the father of three teenagers,
I don't think you'd find it possible to be
too rough on children.
At least, that's my impression at times.
And I like to scold them in what I hope is a friendly way.
But sometimes, every father feels this way.
And there was a man who lived in Perth.
He had about five-dollars worth of boys and girls at three
for a dollar.
The less they were worth, the more they would holler.
The more they would holler, the less they were worth.
For two cents cash, I'd send you to Perth.
[LAUGHTER]
I got something out of my system, you say.
[LAUGHTER]
And for some reason I rather, I think I want this poem.
My publisher isn't sure, but he's always wrong.
[LAUGHTER]
It's called "Susie's New Dog."
Your dog, what dog?
You mean it?
That?
I was about to leave a note pinned to a fish
to warn my cat to watch for a mouse in an overcoat.
[LAUGHTER]
So that's a dog?
Is it any breed that anyone ever knew?
A guest?
Oh, a flea terrier.
Yes, indeed.
Well, now, I am impressed.
I guess no rabbit will try your house
or even cut through your yard, not
when he knows you have a mouse, I mean,
a dog like that on guard.
You have to go?
I'm glad you came.
I don't see a thing like that just every day.
Does it have a name?
Fang, eh?
Well, I must warn my cat.
[LAUGHTER]
I know.
This is too much for children.
I'm learning to adjust to things.
Baxter Bickerbone of Burlington used
to be Sheriff till he lost his gun, used
to be a teacher till he lost his school,
used to be the iceman till he lost his cool, used
to be a husband till he lost his wife,
used to be alive till he lost his life.
When he got to heaven, Baxter said, the climate's
very healthy once you're used to being dead.
[LAUGHTER]
Does that remind me of Tucson?
[LAUGHTER]
And this is a little autobiographical note
I want to impress on my children on being
too right to be polite.
When I was a boy, I was so good people from miles
around would crowd into our neighborhood
and wait without a sound from dawn to dark and half
the night.
And then again, next day, for a chance to watch me be polite
and perhaps to hear me say please, and thank you,
and how'd you do, and would you be so kind,
and oh, how very good of you, and really,
I don't mind, and watch me serve the ladies tea,
and help them with their coats.
Some people filled up two or three large notebooks
full of notes on being good.
One wrote a book on what he learned from me.
So many came that at last I took to charging a modest fee.
From dawn to dark and half the night, and then again,
next day, a nickel to watch me be polite, a dime to hear me
say please, and thank you, and how'd you do, and would you
be so kind, and oh, how very good of you, and really,
I don't mind.
In a year or two and a day or two, I became a millionaire.
And the best of that, as of course you knew,
is that no one seems to care about your manners
when you are rich.
And the rich care even less.
And that's my tale.
The moral of which I should think even you might guess.
You see, I'm having some scolding fun.
This one's called "Thanks Anyhow."
When I was a boy in the Old Town,
I lived on wax and cheese.
I got the cheese from a billy goat.
I got the wax from bees.
Dinner with a billy goat.
Breakfast with the bees.
What's for lunch?
Banana peel.
But first, you must say please.
Dinner was bad and breakfast worse.
Lunch was alas a mess.
I tried the food at your house.
I liked it even less.
[LAUGHTER]
Dinner with a bunch of brats.
Breakfast at the zoo.
Never mind lunch.
I'd rather munch cardboard than eat with you.
[LAUGHTER]
This is a father's revenge you see.
[LAUGHTER]
When happy little children run to skip and dance and play,
I often stop to watch their fun and to smile when
I hear them say, you skunk.
You louse.
You rat.
You brat.
Shut up.
Get lost.
Blab blab.
Drop dead.
Says who?
Oh, yeah.
If you say that once more, I'll split your head.
How sweet their voices and how dare
the way they skip and dance, it makes
me wish that dads were here to warm the seats of their pants.
[LAUGHTER]
And this is a friend of mine tells me
as a piece of black humor, but I'm not sure.
Questions, questions, questions.
What do you know?
It's going to snow.
How can you tell?
By sniff and by smell.
What do you sniff?
The wind off the cliff.
What do you smell?
The ice in the well.
What do they say?
It's coming this way.
How deep will it be?
Two fathoms or three.
What shall I do?
Stay here till it's through.
What shall I eat?
Oxtail and pig's feet.
Where shall I sleep?
In the pen with the sheep.
What if it gets colder?
Put a lamb on your shoulder.
What if it melts?
You can go somewhere else.
Then what will I get?
Your feet good and wet.
How will I drive them?
Bring them here and I fry them.
What of my dad?
He'll say they taste bad.
What of my mother?
She'll cuddle your brother.
What about you?
I'll be glad when you're through.
[LAUGHTER]
Well, maybe one other and going on to something else.
We all have thought a lot about you.
220,523 registered local voters.
Well, yes, including me.
We're asked to vote in secret on what to do with you.
220,522 voted to put you in a cage and throw away the key.
That isn't quite unanimous, but I
think you will agree that as a test of sentiment,
the vote will surely do to indicate
what seems to be a rather general view shared
by the mayor, the Alderman, your teachers, the police,
the deputy dogcatcher, the man who makes the keys,
the man who makes the cages, and the keeper of the zoo.
You might say everyone in town know that's not strictly true,
but almost everyone in town takes a dim view of you.
[LAUGHTER]
You see, those are release poems.
I'm getting my revenge on my kids before they leave home.