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ALICE THORPE
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Response
(to Paternity)

All love is
unsafe, welded by passions,
and by emotion 
twisted out of true. Yet we
such modern humans tend to think
of parenthood as mist and roses,
gentle hearts and sweet correction,
never for one moment remember
stuff of the ancients, or the purple pain
of co-dependency, the writhing 
horror made by feelings
gone awry.

This parented bewilderment,
protective snarl, the violence
of this need to stretch out,
shake, and do ! These mislead
powers and prisons, agonies of fear
you have expressed for me
almost in terms of wantonness.
Frustration and fear, I guess
it is not always so. One dreams,
one sits remembering first steps,
sees once again small bodies
walk away from us, the tilt and fall,
the confidence
and would be there - somehow prevent,
the coffin's hollow fall.

What can I say, since you have said
it all ? Now all these years
of foreign helplessness, the struggle
with an ancient myth, the words
all fallen silent and awry. Knowledge
of cruelty's discipline, the pain
of independent growth, I want
to see my young 
       self sufficient
in their trust, I learn
to give away, to turn my back
sit aloof, sit critical, 
wield the correcting pen 

who would give
shelter, blood and life itself
all anguish to prevent. 

Thus, power to intrude,
and power to push away,
and longing to respond, these
bitter problems rent.


Alice Thorpe
May, 1999