Remembering John Updike

The poem "Nicholas Delbanco":http://www.lsa.umich.edu/English/grad/mfa/mfaFacDetail.asp?ID=243 read during Tuesday's program first appeared in the "June 1999 issue of _Poetry_,":http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/toc.html?issue=1030 and later, in a slightly different form in 2001, in "'Americana'":http://www.randomhouse.com/knopf/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780375412547. From "Americana," as read on Tuesday's NewsHour: A Rescue Today I wrote some words that will see print. Maybe they will last "forever," in that someone will read them, their ink making a light scratch on his mind, or hers. I think back with greater satisfaction upon a yellow bird--a goldfinch?-- that had flown into the garden shed and could not get out, battering its wings on the deceptive light of the dusty, warped-shut window. Without much reflection, for once, I stepped to where its panicked heart was making commotion, the flared wings drumming, and with clumsy soft hands pinned it against a pane, held loosely cupped this agitated essence of the air, and through the open door released it, like a self-flung ball, to all that lovely perishing outdoors. The version published in _Poetry_: A Rescue I wrote some words today that will see print. Maybe they will last "forever"-- that is, more than ten years, in that someone will read them, their ink making a light scratch on his mind, or hers. I think back with greater satisfaction upon a yellow bird -- a goldfinch?-- that had flown into our potting shed and could not get out, battering its wings unintelligently upon the dusty panes of the never-opened windows. Without much reflection, for once, I stepped to where its panicked heart was making commotion, the flared wings drumming, and with clumsy, soft hands pinned it against a pane, held cupped this agitated essence of the air, and through the open door released it, like a self-flung ball to all that lovely perishing outdoors. More about John Updike and his poems can be found at the "Poetry Foundation's Web site":http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poet.html?id=81868. Indeed, that site's most popular poem is Updike's "'Ex-Basketball Player.'":http://www.poetryfoundation.org/journal/feature.html?id=178795