One of the pleasures of my life

Is reading aloud

To a little child

Who still wants to look at the pictures

And listens intently to every word

Fascinated by the story

In fact the same story that was read to me

A million years ago

And I too

Was spellbound and enchanted

By the tale’s drama

Of peasant villagers and pots of porridge

Of wise women and foolish children.

Who would think

When now we live so remote from that life

That all of us children

Me and you and her would

Listen so joyfully

To this old story.