My parents were virgins.
At 22—even then it was a bit much.
Yes, Papa had a reputation as a skirt chaser around the women’s dormitory
but he “went” to the women in order to eat a little,
because he lived on his stipend …
He starting going to Mama also in order to eat.
And when there started to be talk of a wedding at the Institute,
they slipped her a copy of
“How a Girl Becomes a Woman.”
Mama threw it out unopened.
It was scary for them to make me.
It was strange for them to make me.
It was painful for them to make me.
It was funny for them to make me.
And I absorbed:
To live is scary.
To live is strange.
To live is painful.
To live is very funny.
Funniest of all was birth.
—Go—growled the nurse
and waved her
out into the hallway.
She held her stomach from below, and walked out.
Walked, walked, suddenly—a mirror,
and in the mirror—a belly
in a shirt to the navel,
on thin, shivering,
lilac legs.
She laughed for five minutes.
After another five she gave birth.
Translated by Jason Schneiderman