Welcome to the first “Poem of the Month” for 2014!
I’ve been thinking a lot about friends and neighbors lately. Since the last Poem of the Month, we bought a house in a new neighborhood in Seattle. The old one carried me through nine years of memories. It doesn’t surprise me that a lot of my memories are those special family ones of my children or my wife – art projects at the dining room table, gardening together in the back yard, or have a good old fashion family game night.
But I also remember all the wonderful friends who passed through that house – the ones who helped me move, who helped me paint, who came for dinner parties, who traveled from near and far and shared a glass – or a bottle – of wine, who laughed and celebrated; the neighbors who moved my garbage can to the street on days that i forgot to and loaned me that tool that I somehow, miraculously didn’t already have. I thank you all for those memories, those acts of kindness and friendship. Some of those friends have moved away – DC, Alaska, who knows where… We probably all have had friends like that who have drifted in and out of our lives, and you would think eventually the memories – or the friendships – would soon begin to fade. I supposed sometimes it does. But I think that a lot of times there is always that ember of friendship that just simply remains, waiting for us to take the time to blow on it and rekindle it. I guess I aspire to find the time to do more of that.
As inspiration, I hope you enjoy this month’s poem by Robert Frost.
Robert Frost
(1874 – 1963)
A Time To Talk
When a friend calls to me from the road
And slows his horse to a meaning walk,
I don’t stand still and look around
On all the hills I haven’t hoed,
And shout from where I am, What is it?
No, not as there is a time to talk.
I thrust my hoe in the mellow ground,
Blade-end up and five feet tall,
And plod: I go up to the stone wall
For a friendly visit.
