Ethics

Ethics by Linda Pastan



In ethics class so many years ago
our teacher asked this question every fall:
if there were a fire in a museum
which would you save , a Rembrandt painting
or an old woman who hadn't many
years left anyhow? Restless on hard chairs
caring little for pictures or old age
we'd opt one year for life, the next for art
and always half-heartedly. Sometimes
the woman borrowed my grandmother's face
leaving her usual Kitchen to wander
some drafty, half-imagined museum.
One year, feeling clever, I replied
why not let the woman decide herself?
Linda, the teacher would report, eschews
the burden of responsibility.
This fall in a real museum I stand
before a real Rembrandt, old woman,
or nearly so, myself. The colors
within this frame are darker than autumn
darker even than winter-the browns of earth
though earth's most radiant elements burn
through the canvas. I know now that woman
and painting and season are almost one
and all beyond saving by children.


I thought that this poem was very interesting. It really made me think of what I would do in that situation. I came to the conclusion that I would save the old woman.
Now actually talking about the poem. At the beginning the author shows that as a young child she didn't care about a painting or an old lady:
"Restless on hard chairs
caring little for pictures and old age
we'd opt one year for life. the next for art
and always half-heartedly."
Then it goes on to the author showing how she started to actually think about the question asked by thinking of her grandmother:
"Sometimes
the woman borrowed my grandmother's face
leaving her usual kitchen, to wander
some drafty, half-imagined museum."
Then it goes on to show that the author is in a museum as an old lady with a famous work of art:
"This fall in a real museum I stand
before a real Rembrandt, old woman,
or nearly so myself ."

What I got from this poem is that as we grow older the more we learn about what kind of person we want to be. Only with experience will we really know what choice we would make.