Cow [Vache]

Nobody leads the cow
To the greenery cropped and dry
To the greenery without caresses,

The grass which receives it
Must be sweet as a silken thread,
A thread of silk sweet as a thread of milk.

Ignored mother
For the children it is not lunch,
But the milk on the grass
The grass before the cow,
The child before the grass

That is by Paul Eluard, translated by Ted Hughes.  I’ve still been very much enjoying Letters of Ted Hughes. 

Elsewhere in the world of fiction, I found the "philosophical" European bestseller The Elegance of the Hedgehog precious and unbearable; I couldn’t get to page 30.  The new John Updike novel, The Widows of Eastwick, has been mostly panned, but I agree instead with this very positive NYT review.