Welcome to the April 2012 Poem of the Month!
Today we wish April farewell, as well as National Poetry Month. April is always an incredibly special month for me and my family, and this month we have seen a slew of birthdays – my daughter turned 11, and my mother, nephew, sister-in-law, ex-wife and her brother all celebrated birthdays in April. I likewise celebrated my birthday on April 23, which holds the most obvious significance for me because, well, I was born (thanks Mom!). But it also is a significant date for several of my passions:
• First, poetry – The Bard, William Shakespeare was born on April 1564 and curiously died April 23rd 1616 (Happy 448th Will!).
• Having been a bit of an Anglophile most of my life, April 23rd is also the Feast Day of St. George, patron saint of England who also is apparently is famous for some run-in with a dragon of some sort.
• Finally, April 23rd is traditionally the day that Port Producers make their Vintage declarations for the Port wines. For those of you who have never been cornered by me at a party to explain the process ad nauseum, Port wine is typically only declared “Vintage” about 3 times a decade, so usually three times a decade, my birthday is EXTRA special 🙂
Those have all been really wonderful to celebrate, but two other events – book-ending the month on April 6 and today, April 30 are really perhaps the most significant ones that I was contemplating as I made this month’s selection. My parents celebrated their 50th Wedding Anniversary on April 6, and as I think about the love, commitment, selflessness, and even the ups and down they must have experienced over the last 50 years to reach this milestone, I am simply amazed and honored to watch them now – that same love that got them through all those years is still evident every day in their lives together.
Finally, twenty years ago today, I was heading into Georgetown Hospital in DC to donate bone marrow to someone I didn’t know. Honestly, these twenty years have at times been joyous, humbling, and often times just filled with gratitude to have been able to be a part of something that forever changed my outlook on life, and had such a happy ending.
Stanley Kunitz
(1905 – 2006)
The Layers
I have walked through many lives,
some of them my own,
and I am not who I was,
though some principle of being
abides, from which I struggle
not to stray.
When I look behind,
as I am compelled to look
before I can gather strength
to proceed on my journey,
I see the milestones dwindling
toward the horizon
and the slow fires trailing
from the abandoned camp-sites,
over which scavenger angels
wheel on heavy wings.
Oh, I have made myself a tribe
out of my true affections,
and my tribe is scattered!
How shall the heart be reconciled
to its feast of losses?
In a rising wind
the manic dust of my friends,
those who fell along the way,
bitterly stings my face.
Yet I turn, I turn,
exulting somewhat,
with my will intact to go
wherever I need to go,
and every stone on the road
precious to me.
In my darkest night,
when the moon was covered
and I roamed through wreckage,
a nimbus-clouded voice
directed me:
“Live in the layers,
not on the litter.”
Though I lack the art
to decipher it,
no doubt the next chapter
in my book of transformations
is already written.
I am not done with my changes.
