It may not always be so; and I say ...

... by ee cummings is a poem which pretty much sums up what I did recently, wishing him "all happiness" from a distance via a letter ... 


It may not always be so; and I say
That if your lips, which I have loved, should touch
Another's, and your dear strong fingers clutch
His heart, as mine in time not far away;
If on another's face your sweet hair lay
In such a silence as I know, or such
Great writhing words as, uttering overmuch,
Stand helplessly before the spirit at bay;

If this should be, I say if this should be --
You of my heart, send me a little word;
That I may go to him, and take his hands,
Saying, Accept all happiness from me.
Then I shall turn my face, and hear one bird
Sing terribly afar in the lost lands.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines ...

... by Pablo Neruda ... is a poem someone once has written to me, and I have since written to someone else ... 

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.

Write, for example, 'The night is starry
and the stars are blue and shiver in the distance.'

The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

Through nights like this one I held her in my arms.
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.

She loved me, sometimes I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.

To hear the immense night, still more immense without her.
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.

What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
The night is starry and she is not with me.

This is all. In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.
My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

My sight tries to find her as though to bring her closer.
My heart looks for her, and she is not with me.

The same night whitening the same trees.
We, of that time, are no longer the same.

I no longer love her, that's certain, but how I loved her.
My voice tries to find the wind to touch her hearing.

Another's. She will be another's. As she was before my kisses.
Her voice, her bright body. Her infinite eyes.

I no longer love her, that's certain, but maybe I love her.
Love is so short, forgetting is so long.

Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms
my soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer
and these the last verses that I write for her.

Ritual Acts (iii) ...

... is a poem by Adrienne Rich I discovered at the Strand bookshop at NYC and a part of me agrees with it a little ... 

After all - to have loved, wasn't that the object?
Love is the only thing in life
but then you can love too much
or the wrong way, you lose 
yourself or you lose
the person
or you strangle each other 
Maybe the object of love is 
   to have loved 
   greatly
   at one time or another
Like a cinema trailer 
watched long ago 

The hope of loving ...

... by Meister Echkart ...

What keeps us alive, what allows us to endure?

I think it is the hope of loving,

or being loved.

I heard a fable once about the sun going on a journey

to find its source, and how the moon wept

without her lover’s

warm gaze.

We weep when light does not reach our hearts. We wither

like fields if someone close

does not rain their

kindness

upon 

us.

Love at first sight ...

... is by the Polish poet, Wislawa Szymborska, translated by Stanislaw Baranczak and Clare Cavanagh.  It reminds me a little of a little book drawn by a Taiwanese artist called "A Chance of Sunshine" ... 

They're both convinced

that a sudden passion joined them.

Such certainty is beautiful,

but uncertainty is more beautiful still.

Since they'd never met before, they're sure

that there'd been nothing between them.

But what's the word from the streets, staircases, hallways --

perhaps they've passed each other a million times?

I want to ask them

if they don't remember --

a moment face to face

in some revolving door?

perhaps a "sorry" muttered in a crowd?

a curt "wrong number" caught in the receiver?

but I know the answer.

No, they don't remember

They'd be amazed to hear

that Chance has been toying with them

now for years.

Not quite ready yet

to become their Destiny,

it pushed them close, drove them apart,

it barred their path,

stifling a laugh,

and then leaped aside.

There were signs and signals,

even if they couldn't read them yet.

Perhaps three years ago

or just last Tuesday

a certain leaf fluttered

from one shoulder to another?

Something was dropped and then picked up.

Who knows, maybe the ball that vanished

into childhood's thicket?

There were doorknobs and doorbells

where one touch had covered another

beforehand.

Suitcases checked and standing side by side.

One night, perhaps, the same dream,

grown hazy by morning.

Every beginning

is only a sequel, after all,

and the book of events

is always open halfway through.

Mark Strand ...

... is a poet I discovered when I was at NYC earlier this month ...

Provisional eternity

A man and a woman lay in bed. “Just one more time,” said the man, “just one more time.” “Why do you keep saying that?” said the woman. “Because I never want it to end,” said the man. “What don’t you want to end?” said the woman. “This,” said the man, “this never wanting it to end.”

When I turned a hundred

I wanted to go on an immense journey, to travel night and day into the unknown until, forgetting my old self, I came into possession of a new self, one that I might have missed on my previous travels.  But the first step was beyond me.  I lay in bed, unable to move, pondering, as one does at my age, the ways of melancholy - how it seeps into the spirit, how it disincarnates the will, how it banishes the sense to the chill of twilight, how even the best and worst intentions wither in its keep.  I kept staring at the ceiling, then suddenly felt a blast of cold air, and I was gone.  

Our Union ...

… is a poem by a Suri poet called Hafiz.  I like the first three stanzas as it reminds me a common simile of “I love you more than sliced bread”, but I am not sure about the rope in the last stanza …

Our

union is like this:

You feel cold so I reach for a blanket to cover

our shivering feet.

A hunger comes into your body
so I run to my garden and start digging potatoes.

You asked for a few words of comfort and guidance and
I quickly kneel by your side offering you
a whole book as a
gift.

You ache with loneliness one night so much
you weep, and I say

here is a rope, tie it around me,
Hafiz will be your
companion
for life.

Kindness ...

... By Naomi Shihab Nye is a poem I came across at a bookshop at NYC and it seems to be befitting for a city post-Hurricane Sandy and an early winter snow storm ...

Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.

Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.

Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
It is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.