Теодор Рётке. Корова (3 takes)

Нина, приветствую!
Это было, очевидно, даже раньше, чем авария в США на Три-Майл-Айлед (1979). Но, возможно, он был в определённой степени провидцем. А вообще Рётке любил пошутить с лёгкой похабинкой и даже детишек постращать в таком же тоне )).

Roethke's humor was no gentle, prattling thing. After all, one does not go to the axe to learn about politeness. He found his own ribaldry side-splitting and was convinced that nobody since Edward Lear had composed such hilarious rhymes for children.

It was during the wedding visit that he proposed to demonstrate his comic genius by entertaining my three-year-old daughter with a recitation of his nonsense verse. His first selection was a quatrain entitled "The Cow." Dancing around her, thumping out the beat, illustrating the action with appropriate gestures, he roared the lines:


There Once was a Cow with a Double Udder.
When I think of it now, I just have to Shudder!
She was too much for One, you can bet your Life:
She had to be Milked by a Man and His Wife.


The result might have been anticipated. Gretchen burst into tears and tried to hide under the sofa—an episode that made its way, years later, into one of my poems, "Journal for My Daughter." 
https://poetrysociety.org/features/tributes/stanley-kunitz-on-theodore-roethke 

Спасибо за отзыв, Нина! Ваш - замечательный! 

Свободная вариация - )) замечательно! 
Спасибо, Бр!

)) Задорно, Валентин! Рад, что ты откликнулся! Спасибо!
Ну и в продолжение темы 4-й вариант:

В детстве ту корову я не знал по имени,

только помню было у неё два вымени!

Одному такого – счастья – не дай Бог.