(no subject)

[silverflurry.livejournal.com]

CORRESPONDENCE
by Teresa Cader


"I hat you," my daughter writes
in her newfound mastery of phonics.
She has taken to sending me notes
from kindergarten: love notes,
joke notes, problem notes,
and now angry notes that say
I don't care about her feelings.
These notes arrive after lunch
in envelopes, like the mail,
marked by hearts or skulls.
You are "meen" she says today,
you just sit around and "rit"
and don't let me watch "moves."
Why do her notes carry more weight
than her spoken accusations?
She isn't the same child now:
she is an owner, a thief.

Vers de Société - philip larkin

[motheaten.livejournal.com]

My wife and I have asked a crowd of craps
To come and waste their time and ours: perhaps
You'd care to join us? In a pig's arse, friend.
Day comes to an end.
The gas fire breathes, the trees are darkly swayed.
And so Dear Warlock-Williams: I'm afraid -

Funny how hard it is to be alone.
I could spend half my evenings, if I wanted,
Holding a glass of washing sherry, canted
Over to catch the drivel of some bitch
Who's read nothing but Which;
Just think of all the spare time that has flown

Straight into nothingness by being filled
With forks and faces, rather than repaid
Under a lamp, hearing the noise of wind,
And looking out to see the moon thinned
To an air-sharpened blade.
A life, and yet how sternly it's instilled

All solitude is selfish. No one now
Believes the hermit with his gown and dish
Talking to God (who's gone too); the big wish
Is to have people nice to you, which means
Doing it back somehow.
Virtue is social. Are, then, these routines

Playing at goodness, like going to church?
Something that bores us, something we don't do well
(Asking that ass about his fool research)
But try to feel, because, however crudely,
It shows us what should be?
Too subtle, that. Too decent, too. Oh hell,

Only the young can be alone freely.
The time is shorter now for company,
And sitting by a lamp more often brings
Not peace, but other things.
Beyond the light stand failure and remorse
Whispering Dear Warlock-Williams: Why, of course -