Lost in thought, the baby

Primarily

I am a mother.

When he was sick;

I engaged his imagination

with a book—

the perfect—I seized it; his

weakened defenses.

This is the way I have

filled his mind

egg and milk and butter and bread

all together—

that's a lot for a small child to take in.

Like Maisie

in the novel is a sieve.

What we want to cultivate in him:

A fat man's

personality on a thin man.