"Whoever you are now, I place my hand upon you, that you be my poem.
I whisper with my lips close to your ear . . . I love none better than you"
- To You
Walt Whitman
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| Randolph-Macon Woman's College-1980 |
Pretty cute, huh?
Katy and I met because her sister Mary was a good Roman Catholic. That, and the Holy Cross Lynchburg rectory had a basement big enough to store student belongings over the summer. The rest is a really romantic story more than forty years long.
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| Bunder Home - June 26, 1982 |
If you'd like something salacious, something that could go between the glossy covers of romance fiction, I could tell it to you that way. If you prefer a lecture on cognitive restructuring, those are in print.
" -Who wields a poem huger than the grave?
from only Whom shall time no refuge keep
though all the weird worlds must be opened?
)Love"
but if the living dance upon dead minds
ee cummings
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| Lexington, VA Maury River 1983 |
But it's poetry really. All the intimacies of forty years. Magical. Silly. Remarkable. Desirable. Predictable. Unpleasant and unwelcome. Irretrievable. Comfortable. Spiritual. Kids. Grand-kids. If you put it out there like a history, it starts to seem a little common. Ordinary, with a few interesting and juicy bits, but still common. It feels better as a poem.
I sent this to Katy a long time ago and she said we should reread it on our 38th. anniversary.
"Two lovers by a moss-frown spring:
They leaned soft cheeks together there,
Mingled the dark and sunny hair,
And heard the wooing thrushes sing.
O budding time !
O love's blest prime !
Two wedded from the portal stept:
The bells made happy carollings,
The air was soft as fanning wings,
White petals on the pathway slept.
O pure-eyed bride !
O tender pride !
Two faces o'er a cradle bent:
Two hands above the head were locked;
These pressed each other while they rocked,
Those watched a life that love had sent.
O solemn hour !
O hidden power !
Two parents by the evening fire:
The red light fell about their knees
On heads that rose by slow degrees
Like buds upon the lily spire.
O patient life !
O tender strife !
The two still sat together there,
The red shone about their knees;
But all the heads by slow degrees
Had gone and left that lonely pair.
O voyage fast !
O vanished past !
The red light shone upon the floor
And made the space between them wide:
They draw their chairs up side by side.
Their pale cheeks joined and said, "Once more !"
O memories !
O past that is !
George Eliot
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| Family Portrait 1988 |
I kept trying to work this song into my daughters wedding playlists. I don't think it ever made it. As an acknowledgment of the thought though, they took me to a "Florence and the Machine" concert on Northerly Island once on my birthday.
"This fantasy, this fallacy, this stumbling stone
Echoes in a city that's long overgrown
Your heart is the only place that I call home
Can I be returned? You can.
You can. We can.
Just keep following
The heartlines on your hand
Just keep following
The heartlines on your hand
Keep it up. I know you can.
Just keep following
The heartlines on your hand
What a thing to do
What a thing to choose
But know, in some way, I'm there with you
Up against the wall on a Wednesday afternoon.
Just keep following
The heartlines on your hand
Just keep following
The heartlines on your hand
Keep it up. I know you can.
Just keep following
The heartlines on your hand
'Cause I am."
Heartlines
- Florence Welch/Paul Epworth
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| Town & Gown - Mother's Day 2022 |
Pretty cute, huh?
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