The recently released Kurt Vonnegut: Letters (public library), which gave us the beloved author’s curious daily routine, is a treasure trove of nuanced insight into Vonnegut’s life and character. Among the seemingly mundane epistolary chronicles lie gems that shimmer with Vonnegut’s reluctant warmth and peculiar brand of sullen optimism — gems like this delightful short untitled poem Vonnegut sent in a letter to his friend Knox Burger in June of 1961:

Two little good girls
Watchful and wise —
Clever little hands
And big kind eyes —
Look for signs that the world is good,
Comport themselves as good folk should.
They wonder at a father
Who is sad and funny strong,
And they wonder at a mother
Like a childhood song.
And what, and what
Do the two think of?
Of the sun
And the moon
And the earth
And love.

Complement with Denise Levertov’s poem “The Secret,” which bears a certain resemblance of subject and sensibility.