- Nabokov admits that his first poem was terrible, something about memory and caterpillars and the organ grinder's music.
- At the time, Vladimir thought the poem was excellent, and brought it to his mother to read.
- He really wants his mother to like it. "Never in my life had I craved more for her praise. Never had I been more vulnerable." (11.5.2)
- His mother is reading the paper, waiting for his father to call from St. Petersburg to check in.
- She reads the poem and even though she is worried about her husband, lavishes him with praise.
- She then hands him a mirror, where he can see there is a smear of blood on his face from a mosquito. What he really sees, however, is face that is mysteriously unchanged by his "triumph" of poetry.