“I left you because I knew I could never change you. You would stand in the room so still sometimes, as if the greatest betrayal of yourself would be to reveal one more inch of your character.”

—Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

#lit

“We all have an old knot in the heart we wish to untie.”

—Michael Ondaatje, The Cat’s Table

#lit

#the english patient

“That was how he felt safest. Revealing nothing. Whether they came at him with tenderness or subterfuge or knives.”

—Michael Ondaatje, “The English Patient”

“We die containing a richness of lovers and tribes, tastes we have swallowed, bodies we have plunged into and swum up as if rivers of wisdom, characters we have climbed into as if trees, fears we have hidden in as if caves. ”

—Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

“The first sentence of every novel should be: "Trust me, this will take time but there is order here, very faint, very human." Meander if you want to get to town.”

—Michael Ondaatje, In the Skin of a Lion

“We all have an old knot in the heart we wish to untie.”

—Michael Ondaatje, The Cat’s Table

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“She had always wanted words, she loved them; grew up on them. Words gave her clarity, brought reason, shape.”

—Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

“Her life with others no longer interests him. He wants only her stalking beauty, her theatre of expressions. He wants the minute secret reflection between them, the depth of field minimal, their foreignness intimate like two pages of a closed book.”

—The English Patient, Michael Ondaatje

“You have to protect yourself from sadness. Sadness is very close to hate. Let me tell you this. This is the thing I learned. If you take in someone else's poison – thinking you can cure them by sharing it – you will instead store it within you.”

—The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje

April 20, 2013: To A Sad Daughter, Michael Ondaatje

To A Sad Daughter
Michael Ondaatje

All night long the hockey pictures
gaze down at you
sleeping in your tracksuit.
Belligerent goalies are your ideal.
Threats of being traded
cuts and wounds
—all this pleases you.
O my god! you say at breakfast
reading the sports page over the Alpen
as another player breaks his ankle
or assaults the coach.

When I thought of daughters
I wasn’t expecting this
but I like this more.
I like all your faults
even your purple moods
when you retreat from everyone
to sit in bed under a quilt.
And when I say ‘like’
I mean of course ‘love’
but that embarrasses you.
You who feel superior to black and white movies
(coaxed for hours to see Casablanca)
though you were moved
by Creature from the Black Lagoon.

One day I’ll come swimming
beside your ship or someone will
and if you hear the siren
listen to it. For if you close your ears
only nothing happens. You will never change.

I don’t care if you risk
your life to angry goalies
creatures with webbed feet.
You can enter their caves and castles
their glass laboratories. Just
don’t be fooled by anyone but yourself.

This is the first lecture I’ve given you.
You’re ‘sweet sixteen’ you said.
I’d rather be your closest friend
than your father. I’m not good at advice
you know that, but ride
the ceremonies
until they grow dark.

Sometimes you are so busy
discovering your friends
I ache with loss
—but that is greed.
And sometimes I’ve gone
into my purple world
and lost you.

One afternoon I stepped
into your room. You were sitting
at the desk where I now write this.
Forsythia outside the window
and sun spilled over you
like a thick yellow miracle
as if another planet
was coaxing you out of the house
—all those possible worlds!—
and you, meanwhile, busy with mathematics.

I cannot look at forsythia now
without loss, or joy for you.
You step delicately
into the wild world
and your real prize will be
the frantic search.
Want everything. If you break
break going out not in.
How you live your life I don’t care
but I’ll sell my arms for you,
hold your secrets forever.

If I speak of death
which you fear now, greatly,
it is without answers.
except that each
one we know is
in our blood.
Don’t recall graves.
Memory is permanent.
Remember the afternoon’s
yellow suburban annunciation.
Your goalie
in his frightening mask
dreams perhaps
of gentleness.

More parenting: A Little Tooth, Thomas Lux | Goodnight, Li-Young Lee

More hockey: February, Margaret Atwood

On this day in…

2011: Staying After, Linda Gregg
2010: Dream Song 14, John Berryman
2009: What We Kept, Megan Alpert
2008: Please Take Back the Sparrows, Suzanne Buffam
2007: It Happens Like This, James Tate
2006: Tantalus in May, Reginald Shepherd
2005: September Song, Geoffrey Hill

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Follow the world’s creators.

“I left you because I knew I could never change you. You would stand in the room so still sometimes, as if the greatest betrayal of yourself would be to reveal one more inch of your character.”

“We all have an old knot in the heart we wish to untie.”

“That was how he felt safest. Revealing nothing. Whether they came at him with tenderness or subterfuge or knives.”

“We die containing a richness of lovers and tribes, tastes we have swallowed, bodies we have plunged into and swum up as if rivers of wisdom, characters we have climbed into as if trees, fears we have hidden in as if caves. ”

“The first sentence of every novel should be: "Trust me, this will take time but there is order here, very faint, very human." Meander if you want to get to town.”

“We all have an old knot in the heart we wish to untie.”

“She had always wanted words, she loved them; grew up on them. Words gave her clarity, brought reason, shape.”

“Her life with others no longer interests him. He wants only her stalking beauty, her theatre of expressions. He wants the minute secret reflection between them, the depth of field minimal, their foreignness intimate like two pages of a closed book.”

“You have to protect yourself from sadness. Sadness is very close to hate. Let me tell you this. This is the thing I learned. If you take in someone else's poison – thinking you can cure them by sharing it – you will instead store it within you.”

April 20, 2013: To A Sad Daughter, Michael Ondaatje

Tumblr

Follow the world’s creators.

“I left you because I knew I could never change you. You would stand in the room so still sometimes, as if the greatest betrayal of yourself would be to reveal one more inch of your character.”

“We all have an old knot in the heart we wish to untie.”

“That was how he felt safest. Revealing nothing. Whether they came at him with tenderness or subterfuge or knives.”

“We die containing a richness of lovers and tribes, tastes we have swallowed, bodies we have plunged into and swum up as if rivers of wisdom, characters we have climbed into as if trees, fears we have hidden in as if caves. ”

“The first sentence of every novel should be: "Trust me, this will take time but there is order here, very faint, very human." Meander if you want to get to town.”

“We all have an old knot in the heart we wish to untie.”

“She had always wanted words, she loved them; grew up on them. Words gave her clarity, brought reason, shape.”

“Her life with others no longer interests him. He wants only her stalking beauty, her theatre of expressions. He wants the minute secret reflection between them, the depth of field minimal, their foreignness intimate like two pages of a closed book.”

“You have to protect yourself from sadness. Sadness is very close to hate. Let me tell you this. This is the thing I learned. If you take in someone else's poison – thinking you can cure them by sharing it – you will instead store it within you.”

April 20, 2013: ﻿To A Sad Daughter,﻿ Michael Ondaatje

April 20, 2013: To A Sad Daughter, Michael Ondaatje