[New-Poetry] Chekhov

[Anny Ballardini]

sad sad nihilism_
  From: David Graham 
  Sent: Monday, January 29, 2007 3:38 PM


  Also from Writer's Almanac, in a way, since that's how I learned that today is Anton Chekhov's birthday. . . .






  Another Boring Story

  Chekhov has "A Boring Story"
  about a professor. The old man's wife and children
  don't understand him and don't care. 

  His wife's only concern is
  to marry off their daughter
  to this blockhead, a nonentity. 
  So the old man goes on a journey
  to investigate, find out what he can
  about their future son-in-law ... 
  and finds himself in a hotel room
  in a strange town, wondering
  how on earth life brought him there. 

  He has a friend, a young woman. 
  They're not lovers . . .  loving friends. 
  She had an affair that turned sour
  and now she's at loose ends. 
  She asks him what to do, what to live for, 
  and he has nothing to say to her, 
  not a word. That's the end of the story. 

  Here's another boring story about a professor. 
  Years ago he embarked on an affair
  with a young woman. It became a scandal. 
  His wife threw him out, 
  then she took him back. The young woman
  tried to kill herself, I'm told. 

  I see them fairly often. 
  He and I talk about literature
  and what's wrong with the country
  while his wife knits or does some ironing. 

  I find myself looking out the window
  or at the walls. Some surrealist
  recommends staring at a wall
  till something unusual happens ...
  an arm protruding from the wall. 
  He mixes drinks, she lays out cheese-dip. 
  Then the children come running in, 
  streaked with dirt from wherever they've been. 
  They make for the cheese-dip, 
  stick their fingers in and dabble. 

  I've seen them at the table. 
  They snatch the meat from the plate
  with their hands. 

  She smiles at her little savages. 
  One thing's sure: she's not raising her children
  to be members of any faculty.

  -- Louis Simpson, from The Owner of the House: New Collected Poems 1940-2001 (BOA Editions, Ltd.).








  ========================================
  David Graham
  grahamd at ripon.edu
  Home Page:
  http://www.ripon.edu/academics/faculty/GrahamD/index.html
  Poetry Library:
  http://www.ripon.edu/academics/faculty/GrahamD/poetrylib.html
  ==========================================
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