The Prodigal Father and His Child
A POEM
“Well, Father, my share of the farm has
been turned into gold.
I take it and go, and be sure that I will
not crawl
Back to an ancient who mutters of sin
and the Fall.
I will run loose on the hills with the free
and the bold,
Tearing my meat with my teeth, like a
Thracian of old.
I will be valiant and resolute, fearless
and tall.
None shall forbid me anything: winner
take all.
I will have none of the cramped, the rigid,
the cold.”
— “Yet you shall come to me, will it
or not, in the end.
And Death will show you into his
cramped, chill house…
Calling me cold! If you knew how,
this moment, I burn
With longing to draw you once
more to your one true friend,
The One who is father and mother
and lover and spouse —
Crying, my darling, my darling, re-
turn — return!”
© 1986 New Oxford Review. All Rights Reserved
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Williams knew how bored, self-centered, and self-indulgent the rich can be, and how desperately confused, vulnerable, and self-lacerating the poor often are.