For Evangeline
(Some background — See Limerick in this journal.
See also "He's a mad scientist and I'm his beautiful daughter.")
"There was a young lady named Bright…."
"You read too slow, Daddy," she complained. She was childishly irritable about it. "You say a word. Then I think a long time. Then you say another word." I knew what she meant. I remember, when I was a child, my thoughts used to dart in and out among the slowly droning words of any adult. Whole patterns of universes would appear and disappear in those brief moments. "So?" I asked. "So," she mocked me impishly. "You teach me to read. Then I can think quick as I want." "Quickly," I corrected in a weak voice. "The word is 'quickly,' an adverb." She looked at me impatiently, as if she saw through this allegedly adult device to show up a youngster's ignorance. I felt like the dope! |
Related material — The Quick and the Dead
* For example, from the Marvel Comics realm