"You know that song 'If a body catch a body comin' through the rye'? I'd like—"
"It's 'If a body meet a body coming through the rye'!" old Phoebe said.
"It's a poem. By Robert Burns."
"I know it's a poem by Robert Burns."
She was right, though. It is "If a body meet a body coming through the rye."
I didn't know it then, though.
"I thought it was 'If a body catch a body,'" I said.
"Anyway, I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game
in this big field of rye and all. Thousands of little kids, and nobody's around—
nobody big, I mean— except me. And I'm standing on the edge of some crazy cliff.
What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff—
I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're going
I have to come out from somewhere and catch them.
That's all I'd do all day. I'd just be the catcher in the rye
and all. I know it's crazy, but that's the only thing
I'd really like to be. I know it's crazy."
~ JD Salinger
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