Because She Would Ask Me Why I Loved Her ...

... by Christopher Brennan

If questioning would make us wise
No eyes would ever gaze in eyes;
If all our tale were told in speech
No mouths would wander each to each.

Were spirits free from mortal mesh
And love not bound in hearts of flesh
No aching breasts would yearn to meet
And find their ecstasy complete.

For who is there that lives and knows
The secret powers by which he grows?
Were knowledge all, what were our need
To thrill and faint and sweetly bleed?

Then seek not, sweet, the "If" and "Why"
I love you now until I die.
For I must love because I live
And life in me is what you give.

~ is a pretty intense poem, but I love the first and final lines ... I once heard a talk about love, in that instead of saying "I love you because of what you have done, or for whom you are, or if you will ...", we can instead just love with no reason or condition attached ... As to if it is really possible in this earth, I am not sure, but "So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love" (1 Cor 13:13).

Butterfly Laughter ...

... by Katherine Mansfield is a lovely little poem, reminding you of the importance of those precious, little things in life ... we do tend to overcomplicate the various aspects of our lives, and somehow, it is so easy to lose sight of what is important ... Soemtimes, we all just need to be still, and try to remember the blue butterfly in our lives ...

In the middle of our porridge plates
There was a blue butterfly painted
And each morning we tried who should reach the
butterfly first.
Then the Grandmother said: "Do not eat the poor
butterfly."
That made us laugh.
Always she said it and always it started us laughing.
It seemed such a sweet little joke.
I was certain that one fine morning
The butterfly would fly out of our plates,
Laughing the teeniest laugh in the world,
And perch on the Grandmother's lap.

Confession

by Frantisek Halas ...

Touched by all that love is
I draw closer toward you
Saddened by all that love is
I run from you

Surprised by all that love is
I remain alert in stillness
Hurt by all that love is
I yearn for tenderness

Defeated by all that love is
at the truthful mouth of the night
Forsaken by all that love is
I will grow toward you.


- This poem does summarise the spectrum of fears/doubts/longings/joys/pains/hopes one experiences/sees in love, but we still draw toward it, for it is the answer to our souls ...

Nobody knows ...

... is a song by Pink ...

"Nobody knows
Nobody knows but me
That I sometimes cry
If I could pretend that I'm asleep
When my tears start to fall
I peek out from behind these walls
I think nobody knows
Nobody knows no

Nobody likes
Nobody likes to lose their inner voice
The one I used to hear before my life
Made a choice
But I think nobody knows
No no
Nobody knows
No

Baby
Oh the secret's safe with me
There's nowhere else in the world that I could ever be
And baby don't it feel like I'm all alone
Who's gonna be there after the last angel has flown
And I've lost my way back home
I think nobody knows no
I said nobody knows
Nobody cares

It's win or lose not how you play the game
And the road to darkness has a way
Of always knowing my name
But I think nobody knows
No no
Nobody knows no no no no

Baby
Oh the secret's safe with me
There's nowhere else in the world that I could ever be
And baby don't it feel like I'm all alone
Who's gonna be there after the last angel has flown
And I've lost my way back home
And oh no no no no
Nobody knows
No no no no no no

Tomorrow I'll be there my friend
I'll wake up and start all over again
When everybody else is gone
No no no

Nobody knows
Nobody knows the rhythem of my heart
The way I do when I'm lying in the dark
And the world is asleep
I think nobody knows
Nobody knows
Nobody knows but me
Me"

But somebody does ... if you would only believe ...

Would you notice when I am gone?

... is a question which each of us asks ourselves at some points in our lives ... this is a story of someone who died without anyone knowing ...

http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/the_way_we_live/article2334698.ece

but there are people who do care, as shown in the article. Sometimes, we just have to look a bit deeper, to hold onto them a bit longer, to allow them to be a bit closer ... otherwise, we will live in a world where we are utterly alone ...

being adopted as adults ...

... is an article written by Ariel Leve in The Times ... its concept is probably very silly, but it does raise some interesting questions, and somehow, it seems like a good idea for my memory clinic ... it will be good for my patients if they are visited by their "families" every now and then ... families can be so mis-matched, but I suppose that is what makes them special in a strange kinda way ...

http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/ariel_leve/article5113682.ece

change ...

... is something which we all aspire to, as shown in the recent election in America. I have been reading "Germinal" by Emile Zola, and the following paragraphs strike a chord. We all want justice, but can it really be achieved on earth? Can Mr Obama really carry the hope of so many people on his shoulders, without disappointing some? Can we forsake the world that is to come?

~
"What a crazy idea!" said the young man. "Do you need a damn God and his paradise to make you happy? Can't you make your own happiness on earth all by yourself?"

He talked on endlessly, in increasingly passionate tones. And suddenly, the bolts locking the horizon burst open to let a gleam of light break through and illuminate the grim lives of these poor people. The endless chain of poverty, the brutish labour, the bestial life they led, first shorn of their fleeces and then led to the slaughter, all this suffering disappeared, as if a great blaze of sunshine had swept it away; and in a dazzling, magical vision, justice descended from heaven. Since God himself was dead, it would be justice which would now ensure the happiness of men, by opening up a kingdom of equality and fraternity. Just like in fairy-tales, a new society would grow up overnight, a great city, shimmering like a mirage, where each citizen would fulfill his appointed duties and take his part in the community of joy. The rotten old world would crumble to dust, a new young breed of humanity purged of its crimes would form a single, united race of workers , who would have for their motto; to each according to his worth, and each one's worth to be judged according to his efforts. And the dream grew continually vaster and finer, all the more seductive for riding higher and higher into the realms of impossible fantasy.

At first La Mahreude refused to listen, for she was seized with a vague feeling of panic. No, really, it was too fantastic, you shouldn't get carried away by such ideas, for they made life even more revolting afterwards, and then you would kill anyone who got in your way, just to be happy. When she noticed the anxious gleam in Maheu's eyes, she grew worried, seeing him so carried away, and cried out, interrupting Etienne:

"Don't you listen, my dear? Can't you see he's telling us fairy-tales? ... D'you think the bourgeoisie will ever agree to work as hard as we do?"

But little by little the charm started to work on her too. She finally started to smile as her imagination was aroused, tempting her to enter this marvellous world of hope. It was so sweet to forget the pain of reality, if only for an hour! When you live like an animal, with your nose to the grindstone, you need at least a little pocket of lies, so that you can enjoy gloating over things you can never possess. And what really excited her, what made her agree with the young man, was the idea of justice.

"You're right there!" she cried. "For me, once something's just, I will go to hell for it ... And it's true, it would be only justice for us to have fun for a change."

Then Maheu felt able to let himself go.

"In the name of all that's holy! I'm not a rich man, but I'd certainly give a hundred sous not to die before I've seen all that ... What's an upset, eh? Will it happen soon, and how are we going to do it?"

Etienne started talking again. The old society was falling apart, for, he affirmed outright, it couldn't last more than a few months longer. As for the means of putting it into practice, he seemed to be less sure of himself, confusing his sources and, given the ignorance o his audience, feeling no scruples at launching into explanations where he himself was out of his depth. All the systems he knew of went into his maw, smoothed over by his certainty of an easy triumph, of a universal embrace which would put an end to the misunderstandings between the classes; apart from the ill will of one or two individual bosses or bourgeois who might perhaps have to be made to see reason. And the Maheus appeared to understand and approve, accepting this miraculous solutions with the blind faith of converts, like the early Christians at the beginning of the Church who awaited the emergence of a perfect society out of the very compost of the ancient world. Little Alzire hung on every world, imagining happiness as a vision of a very warm house where the children would play all the time and eat as much as they wanted to. Catherine sat transfixed, still holding her chin in her hands. staring at Etienne, and where he fell silent, she shivered slightly, as if she suddenly felt cold.

But La Maheude looked at the cuckoo clock.

"Past nine o'clock, what are we thinking of! We'll never get up in the morning."

And the Maheus left the table, feeling sick at the hart, and near to despair. They had suddenly felt as if they were going to be rich, and now they fell back with a crash into the mire. Old Bonnemort, who was leaving for the pit, complained that that sort of story didn't make the soup taste any better; while the others went upstairs one by one, suddenly noticing the damp on the walls and the foul, fetid air. Upstairs, once Catherine, who was last into bed, had blown out the candle, Etienne heard her tossing and turning feverishly in the midst of the silent and slumbering village before she was able to sleep.

~ by Emile Zola, translated by Peter Collier

Courage ...

~ by Anne Sexton

It is in the small things we see it.
The child's first step,
as awesome as an earthquake.
The first time you rode a bike,
wallowing up the sidewalk.
The first spanking when your heart
went on a journey all alone.
When they called you crybaby
or poor or fatty or crazy
and made you into an alien,
you drank their acid
and concealed it.

Later,
if you faced the death of bombs and bullets
you did not do it with a banner,
you did it with only a hat to
comver your heart.
You did not fondle the weakness inside you
though it was there.
Your courage was a small coal
that you kept swallowing.
If your buddy saved you
and died himself in so doing,
then his courage was not courage,
it was love; love as simple as shaving soap.

Later,
if you have endured a great despair,
then you did it alone,
getting a transfusion from the fire,
picking the scabs off your heart,
then wringing it out like a sock.
Next, my kinsman, you powdered your sorrow,
you gave it a back rub
and then you covered it with a blanket
and after it had slept a while
it woke to the wings of the roses
and was transformed.

Later,
when you face old age and its natural conclusion
your courage will still be shown in the little ways,
each spring will be a sword you'll sharpen,
those you love will live in a fever of love,
and you'll bargain with the calendar
and at the last moment
when death opens the back door
you'll put on your carpet slippers
and stride out.

~ I am not entirely sure how I feel about this poem, but I like the way she describes sorrow, especially given the poetess' history of depression and multiple attempts of suicides ... I think writing such a hopeful poem requires a great deal of courage in itself ...

nothing ...

~ by James Fenton

I take a jewel from a junk shop tray
And wish I had a love to buy it for.
Nothing I choose will make you turn my way.
Nothing I give will make you love me more.

I know that I've embarrassed you too long
And I'm ashamed to linger at your door.
Whatever I embark on will be wrong.
Nothing I do will make you love me more.

I cannot work. I cannot read or write.
How can I frame a letter to implore?
Eloquence is a lie. The truth is trite.
Nothing I say will make you love me more.

So I replace the jewel in the tray
And laughingly pretend I'm far too poor.
Nothing I give, nothing I do or say,
Nothing I am will make you love me more.

... reminds me a little of the poem "Flowers" by Wendy Cope, although they are different in their approaches, as "Nothing" is far more negative in tone ... but it does make you wonder what will happen if they just reach out a little ...

The Blower's Daughter ...

... by Damien Rice is the opening song in "Closer" ~ a film which just breaks your heart and stays with you for a long time after watching it ... This song sums up the film beautifully; the sense of loss, the hopelessness, the uncertainties of life, the loose ends which we hold onto so desperately, while they drift away in the wind, forever disappearing from our clasps ... maybe sometimes, it is only in losing when you learn its true meaning ...

"And so it is
Just like you said it would be
Life goes easy on me
Most of the time
And so it is
The shorter story
No love, no glory
No hero in her skies

I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes...

And so it is
Just like you said it should be
We'll both forget the breeze
Most of the time
And so it is
The colder water
The blower's daughter
The pupil in denial

I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes...

Did I say that I loathe you?
Did I say that I want to
Leave it all behind?

I can't take my mind off you
I can't take my mind off you...
I can't take my mind off you
I can't take my mind off you
I can't take my mind off you
I can't take my mind...
My mind...my mind...
'Til I find somebody new"

The Embrace ...

You weren't well or really ill yet either;
just a little tired, your handsomeness
tinged by grief or anticipation, which brought
to your face a thoughtful, deepening grace.

I didn't for a moment doubt you were dead.
I knew that to be true still, even in the dream.
You'd been out--at work maybe?--
having a good day, almost energetic.

We seemed to be moving from some old house
where we'd lived, boxes everywhere, things
in disarray: that was the story of my dream,
but even asleep I was shocked out of the narrative

by your face, the physical fact of your face:
inches from mine, smooth-shaven, loving, alert.
Why so difficult, remembering the actual look
of you? Without a photograph, without strain?

So when I saw your unguarded, reliable face,
your unmistakable gaze opening all the warmth
and clarity of you--warm brown tea--we held
each other for the time the dream allowed.

Bless you. You came back, so I could see you
once more, plainly, so I could rest against you
without thinking this happiness lessened anything,
without thinking you were alive again.

~ Mark Doty

Forgetfulness ...

The name of the author is the first to go
followed obediently by the title, the plot,
the heartbreaking conclusion, the entire novel
which suddenly becomes one you have never read,
never even heard of,

as if, one by one, the memories you used to harbor
decided to retire to the southern hemisphere of the brain,
to a little fishing village where there are no phones.

Long ago you kissed the names of the nine Muses goodbye
and watched the quadratic equation pack its bag,
and even now as you memorize the order of the planets,

something else is slipping away, a state flower perhaps,
the address of an uncle, the capital of Paraguay.

Whatever it is you are struggling to remember
it is not poised on the tip of your tongue,
not even lurking in some obscure corner of your spleen.

It has floated away down a dark mythological river
whose name begins with an L as far as you can recall,
well on your own way to oblivion where you will join those
who have even forgotten how to swim and how to ride a bicycle.

No wonder you rise in the middle of the night
to look up the date of a famous battle in a book on war.
No wonder the moon in the window seems to have drifted
out of a love poem that you used to know by heart.
~ Billy Collins

I have sat through a few memory clinics recently, and dementia is extremely hard to deal with, but I love the way the poet embraces it with such open arms, associating the moon with a love poem long forgotten, but never long lost ...

From: Parnell to Queenie ...

Paris......

I have no pictures of you now
I didn't keep the few you left me:
notes...a handful of scraps...
fraying to powder at the edges
fading
on the age-stained folds.
But you are always before me
like that apt word on the tip of the tongue
that doesn't come
--a certain expression on faces
that turn the inquisitive head
....where did I see that before?
on whom?
Your voice with one woman,
your walk with another
...the flurry of an entrance
...the hat askew
your neck before me, your back,
you hands raising a cup.
You are vanishing
bit by bit
like broken glass smoothed
in the roll of the sea.

And I thought...isn't it the same
with the relics of the saints,
a tooth here,
this one's clothes, that one's handkerchief, yet another's pen.

And then I realised that I'm a relic of you,
my hair you ran your fingers through
my lips where you laid your mouth.

You didn't fall with the white flakes of your letters
I tore up on the Pont Neuf.
The river didn't swallow you along with them.
You last while I do.

~ by Padraig O Snodaigh
From the Irish, trans. by Gabriel Fitzmaurice

What a beautiful poem ... talking about the love that is never lost, despite its physical realities, because "you last while I do". It does express a different sentiments to "if you forget me" ... but both poems are equally loving in its own way ...

Love is a many-splendored thing ...

Love is a many splendored thing
It's the April rose that only grows in the early spring
Love is nature's way of giving a reason to be living
The golden crown that makes a man a king
Once on a high and windy hill
In the morning mist two lovers kissed and the world stood still
Then your fingers touched my silent heart and taught it how to sing
Yes, true love's a many splendored thing

~ a song by Four Aces

What am I to you ...

What am I to you
Tell me darling true
To me you are the sea
Fast as you can be
And deep the shade of blue

When you're feeling low
To whom else do you go
See I cry if you hurt
I'd give you my last shirt
Because I love you so

If my sky should fall
Would you even call
Opened up my heart
I never want to part
I'm giving you the ball

When I look in your eyes
I can feel the butterflies
I love you when you're blue
Tell me darlin' true
What am I to you

Yeah well if my sky should fall
Would you even call
Opened up my heart
Never wanna part
I'm giving you the ball

When I look in your eyes
I can feel the butterflies
Could you find a love in me
Could you carve me in a tree
Don't fill my heart with lies

I will you love when you're blue
Tell me darlin' true
What am I to you
What am I to you
What am I to you

~ Norah Jones

Again and again ...

Again and again, however we know the landscape of love
and the little churchyard there, with its sorrowing names,
and the frighteningly silent abyss into which the others
fall: again and again the two of us walk out together
under the ancient trees, lie down again and again
among the flowers, face to face with the sky.

~ Rainer Maria Rilke (translated by Stephen Mitchell)

The life that I have ...

The life that I have
Is all that I have
And the life that I have
Is yours

The love that I have
Of the life that I have
Is yours and yours and yours.

A sleep I shall have
A rest I shall have
Yet death will be but a pause
For the peace of my years
In the long green grass
Will be yours and yours and yours.

~ Leo Marks
It is believed that Leo wrote this poem about his girlfriend, Ruth, who was killed in an air crash. What an amazingly loving poem ...

I am very bothered ...

I am very bothered when I think
of the bad things I have done in my life.
Not least that time in the chemistry lab
when I held a pair of scissors by the blades
and played the handles
in the naked lilac flame of the Bunsen burner;
then called your name, and handed them over.

O the unrivalled stench of branded skin
as you slipped your thumb and middle finger in,
then couldn't shake off the two burning rings. Marked,
the doctor said, for eternity.

Don't believe me, please, if I say
that was just my butterfingered way, at thirteen,
of asking you if you would marry me.

~ Simon Armitage

This is one of my favourite poems when I was at school ... it is amazing to have found it again now ...

Coat ...

Sometimes I have wanted
to throw you off
like a heavy coat.

Sometimes I have said
you would not let me
breathe or move.

But now that I am free
to choose light clothes
or none at all

I feel the cold
and all the time I think
how warm it used to be.
~ Vicki Feaver

i carry your heart with me ...

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)
~ e e cummings