La vuelta al cole
Full of certainties and reasons,
or uncertainties and reason,
full of reasons as a conch contains the sea,
they wait; for the term’s first bell;
for another mismatched wrestle through the year;
for a teacher who’s religious in his art,
a wizard of a sort, to call the role
cause people
to appear.
The best look like the swinging door
to the Opera just before
the Marx Brothers break through.
The worst — debased,
on the back row,
as far as one can go
from speech –
are walls where childish scribbling’s been erased;
are stones
to teach.
And I am paid to ask them questions:
Dare man proceed by need alone?
Did Esau like
his pottage?
Is any heart in order after Belsen?
And when one stops to think, I’ll catch his heel,
put scissors to him, excavate his chest!
Watch, freshmen, for my words about the past
can make you turn your back. I wait to throw,
most foul, most foul, the future in your face.
El poema, “Freshmen”, lo escribe Barry Spacks y lo selecciona Robert Pinsky para el Washington Post. Me pregunto hasta qué punto algo de lo que dice podría aplicarse a España… y ahí hay un problema. Este año que empieza tengo bajo mi responsabilidad a siete estudiantes: seis por licenciarse y yo por doctorarme. Todo un año para solamente siete individuos, parece un regalo.
