Thanks for understanding, and: Thanks for understanding, and for making my 50th anniversary, of my ambition to poetry, better than it would have been without your presence.
“It is the holy art of: “It is the holy art of staying soft
when the air is stiff with tension,
of whispering calm when the storm is not yours,
but rages through the person you adore.”
That stanza is a poem in itself and so flaring with the actual experience of love, not just the pretty concept, that it seems emblazoned, instinctively, on our true self, our inner being. That is greatness.
How deftly you cut through all the fluff, the cliches, the fantasies and tropes and got right to it. You gave an impeccable, heart-clutching example of love—the rock-solid, imperfect, ultimately perfect, kind—and expressed it with indisputable clarity.
Soon every ephemeral, counterfeit kind of affection seems like fading smoke next to a connection on the soul level you described when we are “met in the stillness/ and held as if we were light”.
Sublime truth.
Part homage to Cavafy, part: Part homage to Cavafy, part celebration of Love that dances to whatever music fills its heart and part tribute to precious spirits with a talent for freedom.
The prudes can just find something else to do with their time.
The day you became a Poet was: The day you became a Poet was a monumental event for you and everyone who has encountered you on these sites. Do something special for yourself! You deserve it, bringer of light and art.
Thank you very much for the: Thank you very much for the validation. Today is a special for me, the fiftieth anniversary of the day I felt called to write poetry. It was a Monday, also, in 1975, and my carefully constructed world of anticipations (like being a writer of science fiction prose) had come crashing down around my bewildered head. Anyhow, the few changes I am effecting today will be permanent (given the day's personal significance) until I am called home.
It's always good when a:
It's always good when a reading has caught the paradox.
The poem points us toward silence as meaning,
but it takes words to open that door.
That tension where needing language to notice
what lies beyond language bounces off Zen and Buddhist thought.
Your reflection shows the poem did its work: it made the silence audible.
What you said about needing words to hear the silence captures the paradox beautifully.
That’s exactly the space I hoped the poem would open up.
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