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it's then- then that we plug our ears, and bury
our faces in our pillows, just like cowards
who hear a distant fusillade! Our worries
are many.... As when, lately, in the pear tree,
a worm appeared- a monstrous, warty worm,
a green-hued devil! Or when aphids, like
a clammy rash, will coat a youthful vine.
And so it goes.
Passerby
Yet what a sense of pride
for you, what joy it must be to receive
the ruddy, aromatic thank-you's that
your trees give to you!
Wife
Grand-dad, too, awaits
assiduously some kind of revelation,
pressing his ear first to the bark, then to
a petal. ... He believes, it seems to me,
that dead men's souls live on in lilies, or
in cherry trees.
Passerby
I wouldn't mind a chat
with him- I'm fond of gentle simpletons
like that.
Wife
I look and look at you but I
just cannot figure out your age. You don't seem
PARTISAN REVIEW
too young, and yet there's something.... I don't know.
Passerby
Dear lady, I'm in my sixth decade.
Husband
Then
you've lived a life of peace- there's not a wrinkle
upon your brow.
Passerby
wrote it all down.
Of peace, you say!
(laughs)
If
I
Sometimes I, even, cannot
