Ode to my Bedroom Shoes

Yesterday my new bedroom shoes arrived in the mail. They are exquisite, so they reminded me of the first poem by the great poet Pablo Neruda that I ever read, "Ode to my Socks." I have written my own ode about my bedroom shoes, and I have posted Neruda's ode below in case you want to read genuis writing about socks.

Ode to my Bedroom Shoes

My friend Susan showed me
her bedroom shoes
which she bought herself
with the money she earned between international jaunts,
bedroom shoes as soft as rabbits.
I slipped my feet into them
as if there were two cases
knitted with threads of twilight
and lambskin,
Animal bedroom shoes,
my feet were guinea pigs made of
lambskin,
two long squirrels
golden, stuffed through
with tan fur,
two tiny cats,
two rodents,
my feet were graced in this way by these heavenly bedroom shoes.
they were so beautiful for the first time
my bare feet seemed to me
unacceptable
like two decrepit firewomen,
firewomen unworthy of that woven fire,
of those lively bedroom shoes.

Nevertheless, I resisted the sharp temptation
to save them somewhere as
I kept fireflies as a child,
as I collected learned texts
when I could read them.
I resisted the mad impulse to put them
in a golden cage and each day give them
birdseed and pieces of pink melon.
Like explorers in the jungle
who hand over the very rare green deer
to the spit and eat it with remorse,
I stretched out my feet and pulled on
the magnificent bedroom shoes.

The moral of my ode is this:
beauty is twice beauty
and what is good is doubly good
when it is a matter of
bedroom shoes
made of lambskin.

Here is Pablo Neruda's:

Ode to My Socks

Mara Mori brought me
a pair of socks
which she knitted herself
with her sheepherder's hands,
two socks as soft as rabbits.
I slipped my feet into them
as if they were two cases
knitted with threads of twilight and goatskin,
Violent socks,
my feet were two fish made of wool,
two long sharks
sea blue, shot through
by one golden thread,
two immense blackbirds,
two cannons,
my feet were honored in this way
by these heavenly socks.
They were so handsome for the first time
my feet seemed to me unacceptable
like two decrepit firemen,
firemen unworthy of that woven fire,
of those glowing socks.

Nevertheless, I resisted the sharp temptation
to save them somewhere as schoolboys
keep fireflies,
as learned men collect
sacred texts,
I resisted the mad impulse to put them
in a golden cage and each day give them
birdseed and pieces of pink melon.
Like explorers in the jungle
who hand over the very rare green deer
to the spit and eat it with remorse,
I stretched out my feet and pulled on
the magnificent socks and then my shoes.

The moral of my ode is this:
beauty is twice beauty
and what is good is doubly good
when it is a matter of two socks
made of wool in winter.