Well, having sort of brought the father into the poem,
I could go back then and read--
It's funny.
I haven't read this poem to an audience for a long time.
And of course, the problem with what we call occasional poems--
poem is written to an occasion is
that they wear themselves out.
And in 100 years, you have to have
PhD candidates explain what the subjects are being referred to.
But in spite of the fact that this is an old poem,
the references seem almost yesterday.
The New York Times, I'm sure you know,
is something that's kind of prideful to get up in Boston,
to get it delivered.
That means you're really an intellectual.
So there's sort of that overtone to it too.
And this is called "The New York Times"
and the title runs into the poem.
"The New York Times".
"Come rolled, a hero sandwich, 300 miles North
of its printing.
Unfurled over breakfast gives weight,
volume, gravity to the puffball bellies of the world's waifs.
Mouthfuls of bad news in with the corn flakes.
Suez to Saigon, Prague to Biafra.
The bacon is worked as, the coffee
is black as the day of my father's death.
Some days, my father, hairs sprouting out
of the V of his pajamas, took in the sit downs, picket lines,
Pinkertons, Buddhists, land lease under his mustache.
In with the hash browns, in with the double
yoked once over lightly eggs.
Mouthfuls of bad news.
Nothing has changed, papa.
The same green suburban lawns, the same fat life."