about
being with you again — if people could see
into
my heart I should almost feel ashamed.”
W. A. M.
I’m borrowing the words of Mozart,
Words that describe what lives in my heart,
To tell thee - but I won't, ever, have no fear -
Of emotions I have no right to hold in here.
My body begins to shudder - heart, to race -
With cascading desire at the sight of thy face;
Thy shadow – sun-cast against the wall –
Weakens my resolve and I tumble, I fall
Like Alice down the rabbit hole.
Thee owns me, Beloved – body and soul.
(c) Martha McLemore, 13 February 2015

10 comments:
Amor
Aorta
The perfect antidote to the day! I will return to this many times today, I just feel it in my bones.
"...the peanut butter of February..." HAH!
Happy Valentine’s Day, Martha.
And to you, Michael. Thank you.
Quite heroic - maintaining the sentiment while being strangled to death by the need to rhyme and to make the thing scan. I hadn't realised the opportunities provided by thee/thy ('tis quite obviously the language of love); you could call it your secret weapon. Not available to the non-Qs. It's not fair.
May I make one small suggestion in line 3. By comma-ing off "ever" you imply a syntactical relationship between what precedes and what follows. In fact "have no fear" is virtually a separate sentence. Also dashes are stronger versions of commas.
How about:
To tell thee, but I won't ever - have no fear
Or perhaps - do not fear.
It's a truly wonderful sentiment about ultimate love.
All the best, Martha.
A hug to you Martha.
The poem was an off-the-cuff response to Mozart's words to his wife. I was remembering a time when I felt like a kid again over someone I was falling for - or thought I walling for. I don't see it heroic, in any sense of the word.
I hadn't considered whether of not it scanned, just wrote what came to me. As for the Quakerly thee/thy, hadn't thought of that, either. I wanted what I wrote to have a timeless, ageless quality to it, so I used an old form of address.
Thought that by using the comma before and following the word ever, that that would give the word the emphasis I intended. In fact, this whole bit (- but I won't, ever, have no fear) might have read better had it stood alone. Of course it wouldn't have rhymed so handily.
I stayed with 'have no fear' because it seemed to me to fit with thee/thy.
Something to think about next time I get the urge to dash off a bit of fluff. I appreciate your critique, Robbie.
Thank you, Susan. It was fun to write.
Many hugs to you, too, Lucy. :)
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