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April 14, 2008

Papa Poems From Siv Widerberg's I'm Like Me

It's not perfect, but it's a perfect artifact of the era: The 1973 collection of poems by Swedish poet/writer/school teacher Siv Widerberg was published by The Feminist Press under the title, "I'm Like Me: Poems for people who want to grow up equal." They're translated by Verne Moberg. It's hard to excerpt a poem, so I'll just post a couple of short ones, dad-related ones, so you can get a flavor of pre-Ikea Swedish childhood:

Papa
My papa can drive a car
My papa can fix electric motors
My papa can carry heavy, heavy things
My papa can quarrel with Uncle Carl
My papa can fry beef fried with onions
My papa can be kind
and comfort me when I cry

But can he cry himself?

I don't know

___


The Papa Beat The Boy
The papa beat the boy
and the boy beat his wife

"I got licked
when I was little
and it didn't hurt me
any,"
said the boy

"But it hurts me though,"
said his wife
(hitting the baby who screamed)

Buy your own vintage copy of I'm Like Me, poems by Siv Widerberg, at Abebooks, $1-12 [abebooks]

posted April 14, 2008 11:56 AM | add to del.icio.us | digg this

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