Читать книгу Mercy Wears a Red Dress - David Craig - Страница 16

a tall cardboard store one Christmas,

empty labeled cans, boxes for the shelves.

It was generous; and though I liked feeling

that I might have a grocer’s place

in this world—I didn’t.

Did I want to sell my helpful sister

some beans? Why, yes I did!

But that was it: no conversation, no tension,

no narrative; just “You shop,” “I sell.”

Another possible direction—dashed!

A young Shelley

would have been good company

at that point: all the tides and empty seas

in the world—in a grey basement—

everything reduced to what was not there!

How quickly, I wonder, did that little shop

get set aside? How quickly did the cardboard

age, bend, unattended; how quickly did it,

like my parents’ optimism,

find its way to the curb?

Parental silence is a horrible thing:

watching as they sift, trying to guide.

Thankfully, my position of Professor

is much easier to maintain, probably