John Updike
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John UpdikeThoughts While Driving HomeWas I clever enough? Was I charming?Did I make at least one good pun? Was I disconcerting? Disarming? Was I wise? Was I wan? Was I fun? Did I answer that girl with white shoulders Correctly, or should I have said (Engagingly), “Kierkegaard smolders, But Eliot’s ashes are dead?” And did I, while being a smarty, Yet some wry reserve slyly keep, So they murmured, when I’d left the party, “He’s deep. He’s deep. He’s deep”? Chambered NautilusHow many rooms oneoccupies to lead a life! – the child's small cell, within earshot of his parents' s mothered moans; the college room assigned by number, a poster-clad outpost of freedom; the married man's bedchamber, cramped scene of glad possession and sneaking sorrow; the holiday rental, redolent of salt and sun and other people's cast-off days; the capstone mansion with its curtained pomp; the businessman's hotel, a one-night stand whose trim twin beds and TV sketch a dream of habitation soon forgot; the chill guest room; the pricey white hospital space, where now the moaning has become one's own. Not Cancelled YetSome honorary dayif I play my cards right I might be a postage stamp but I won’t be there to lick me and licking is what I liked, in tasty anticipation of the long dark slither from the mailbox, from box to pouch to hand to bag to box to slot to hand: that box is best whose lid slams open as well as shut, admitting a parcel of daylight, the green top of a tree, and a flickering of fingers, letting go. |