The Potato Eaters

By Leonard E. Nathan 1924–2007

Sometimes, the naked taste of potato

reminds me of being poor.

The first bites are gratitude,

the rest, contented boredom.

The little kitchen still flickers

like a candle-lit room in a folktale.

Never again was my father so angry,

my mother so still as she set the table,

or I so much at home.

Reprinted by permission of the author, whose most recent book is Tears of the Old Magician, Orchises Press, 2003.

Source: Tears of the Old Magician (Orchises Press, 2003)

Biography

Leonard E. Nathan was a poet, critic, translator and professor emeritus of rhetoric at the University of California-Berkeley. Born in 1924 to the son of Jewish immigrants in southern California, Nathan went on to attend graduate school at Berkeley, earning his PhD in 1961. Instrumental in many of the transformational changes occuring within the University during the late 1960s, Nathan was regarded as one of the founding fathers . . .

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