A dog that spoke, a monster born of sheep
We mercilessly kill, and kill the thought,
Yet house the parrot and let the centaur go,
These being to their nature and those not.
We laugh at apes, that never quite succeed
At eating soup or wearing hats.
Adam had named so many but not this,
This that would name a curse when it had come,
Unfinished man, or witch, or myth, or sin,
Not ever father and never quite a son.
Ape had outstripped him, dog, and darling lamb,
And all the kindergarten beasts.
Enter the bare room of his mind and count
His store of words with letters large and black;
See how he handles clumsily those blocks
With swans and sums; his colored picture books.
At thirty-five he squeals to see the ball
Bounce in the air and roll away.
Pity and fear we give this innocent
Who maimed his mother’s beautiful instinct;
But she would say, “My body had a dog;
I bore the ape and nursed the crying sheep.
He is my kindness and my splendid gift
Come from all life and for all life.”
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