“I’m sure he has,” Rosen said, and he might just as well have been attesting to a belief in the process of evolution.
But one had to remember that he was here in an official capacity; you couldn’t expect him to gush and sigh. He must see dozens of families every day and hear dozens of wives attest to their love for their husbands. He could probably even distinguish those who meant it from those who didn’t, from those who were no longer quite so sure. She tried to stifle her disappointment, though it was clear to her she probably would not be able to get off so solid a remark again.
Rosen had set his paper down now. “And so you just — well, live here,” he said, tossing the remark out with a little roll of the hands, “and see your friends, and your husband teaches and writes, and you keep house—”
“As I said, today is just my lazy day—”
“—and have a normal young people’s life. That’s about it then, would you say?”
“Well—” He seemed to have left something out, though she couldn’t put her finger on it. “Yes. I suppose that’s it.”
He nodded. “And you go to the movies,” he said, “and see an occasional play, and have dinner out once in a while, I suppose, and take walks”—his hands went round with each activity mentioned—“and try to put a few dollars in the bank, and have little spats, I suppose—”
She couldn’t stand it, she was ready to scream. “We read, of course.” Though that wasn’t precisely what she felt had been omitted, it was something.
He didn’t seem to mind at all having been interrupted. “Are you interested in reading?”
“Well, yes. We read.”
He considered further what she had said; or perhaps he was only waiting for her to go on. He said finally, “What kind of books do you like best? Do you like fiction, do you like nonfiction, do you like biography of famous persons, do you like how-to-do-it books, do you like who-done-its? What kind of books would you say you liked to read?”
“Books.” She became flustered. “All kinds.”
He leaned back now. “What books have you read recently?” To the question, he gave nothing more or less than it had ever had before in the history of human conversation and its impasses.
It was her turn now to wave hands at the air. “God, I can’t remember. It really slips my mind.” She felt the color of her face changing again. “We’re always reading something though — and, well, Faulkner. Of course I read The Sound and the Fury in college, and Light in August, but I’ve been planning to read all of Faulkner, you know, chronologically. To get a sense of development. I thought I’d read all of him, right in a row …”
His reply was slow in coming; he might have been waiting for her to break down and give the name of one thin little volume that she had read in the last year. “That sounds like a wonderful project, like a very worth-while project.”
In a shabby way she felt relieved.
“And your poetry,” he asked, “what kind of poetry do you write?”
“What?”
“Do you write nature poems, do you write, oh I don’t know, rhymes, do you write little jingles? What kind of poetry would you say you write?”
Her eyes widened. “Well, I’m sorry, I don’t write poetry,” she said, as though he had stumbled into the wrong house.
“Oh I’m sorry,” he said, leaning forward to apologize. “I misunderstood.”
“Ohhhh,” Libby cried. “Oh, just this morning you mean.”
Even Rosen seemed relieved; it was the first indication she had that the interview was wearing him down too. “Yes,” he said, “this morning. Was that a nature poem, or, I don’t know, philosophical? You know, your thoughts and so forth. I don’t mean to be a nuisance, Mrs. Herz,” he said, spreading his fingers over his tie. “I thought we might talk about your interests. I don’t want to pry, and if you—”
“Oh yes, surely. Poetry, well, certainly,” she said in a light voice.
“And the poem this morning, for instance—”
“Oh that. I didn’t know you meant that. That was — mostly my thoughts. I guess just a poem,” she said, hating him, “about my thoughts.”
“That sounds interesting.” He looked down at the floor. “It’s very interesting meeting somebody who writes poetry. Speaking for myself, I think, as a matter of fact, that there’s entirely too much television and violence these days, that somebody who writes poetry would be an awfully good influence on a child.”
“Thank you,” Libby said softly. Of course she didn’t hate him. She closed her eyes — though not the two shiny dark ones that Rosen could see. She closed her eyes, and she was back in that garden, and it was dusk, and her husband was with her, and in her arms was a child to whom she would later, by the crib, recite some of her poetry. “I think so too,” she said.
“—what makes poetry a fascinating subject,” she heard Rosen saying, “is that people express all kinds of things in it.”
“Oh yes, it is fascinating. I’m very fond of poetry. I like Keats very much,” and she spoke almost passionately now (as though her vibrancy while discussing verse would make up for the books she couldn’t remember having read recently). “And I like John Donne a great deal too, though I know he’s the vogue, but still, I do. And I like Yeats. I don’t know a lot of Yeats, that’s true, but I like some of him, what I know. I suppose they’re mostly anthologized ones,” she confessed, “but they’re awfully good. The worst are full of passionate intensity, the best lack all conviction.’ ” A second later she said, “I’m afraid I’ve gotten that backwards, or wrong, but I do like that poem, when I have it in front of me.”
“Hmmmm,” Rosen said, listening even after she had finished. “You seem to really be able to commit them to memory. That must be a satisfaction.”
“It is.”
“And how about your own poems? I mean — would you say they’re, oh I don’t know, happy poems or unhappy poems? You know, people write all kinds of poems, happy poems, unhappy poems — what do you consider yours to be?”
“Happy poems,” said Libby. “Very happy poems.”
At the front door, while Mr. Rosen went round in a tiny circle wiggling into his little coat, he said, “I suppose you know Rabbi Kuvin.”
“Rabbi who?”
He was facing her, fastening buttons. “Bernie Kuvin. He’s the rabbi over in the new synagogue. Down by the lake.”
She urged up into her face what she hoped was an untroubled look. “No. We don’t.”
Rosen put on his hat. “I thought you might know him.” He looked down and over himself, as though he had something more important on his mind anyway, like whether he was wearing his shoes or not.
She understood. “No, no, we don’t go around here to the synagogue. We’re New Yorkers, originally that is — we go when we’re in New York. We have a rabbi in New York. Rabbi Lichtman. You’re right, though,” she said, her voice beginning to reflect the quantity and quality of her hopelessness. “You’re perfectly right”—her eyes were teary now—“religion is very important—”