Moonlight Symphony (Miami Summer) P. Crockett

I have always loved this poem. So it occurred to me to send it to Katy.  And also (quite likely to her horror) to you. I have changed the gender in the final paragraph, by the way, figuring that not even the poet would really mind.

Photographs Taken in the Florida Everglades by Katy Raits.

LIFE is easy for no one, if you are following the growth path that is yours alone.  That has always been so, yet never more true than now, as the world we have always known continues to unravel.  Countless deaths large and small are happening all around (each additional lay-off, for example, adding another casualty), and have been for what seems forever.  We stand benumbed, waiting upon the promise of rebirth.

Many dear to me are struggling.  And so, this one is for you.

FOR CONSTANTINE CAVAFY

Reading your book

I see you now

again in your Alexandria,

leaning

toward the window of a shop

where the light

catches the dust and touches

the features of a young man within.

Watching,

you catch sight of your reflection

mottled in the glass,

and move away,

last words of a poem

rising to your mind:

“Later, in a happier time,a man just like me

will appear, and act freely.”

Sometimes,

remembering my silences,

my lost moments,

the line of burnt-out candles,

I despair with you, Cavafy.

And then, sometimes,

I think: this is that happy time;

I am the woman.

-- Ian Young

NO struggle for growth, of any sort, is ever for naught, and neither is it unending.

If you take heart, then so will I.

Thank you.

Share on Facebook

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 18th, 2010 at 1:26 pm and is filed under Art. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.