We talk about love. Sometimes I love you more, sometimes less, he says. I feel the same way. Think spectrum, range, hot warm cold as in water from a faucet, the flow increasing, decreasing, the temperature not always perfect, but good enough. Or we could say it's a matter of orange juice, eggplant . . .
He is groggy in the morning. I wake up renewed and ready for the day. Ready, first thing, to squeeze oranges for him. He can't begin, doesn't want to begin, without a glass of fresh juice brought to him in bed. A simple act for me. For him, a big ahh, quenching, invigorating.
I don't have patience to fry eggplants for dinner. He does. He stands by the stove, tender with the slices, spicing them exactly right, turning them exactly on time. I devour the eggplant, stuff the browned slices into pita bread with cheese or eggs, tomatoes, hummus. With anything, everything.
Some moments we meld --- grateful to be living this life together. Other times we argue like kids. I tell him his way is mood-based, head in the sand, slow. He says I have no priorities: everything is important, demands attention. Sometimes you can't stand me, right? he asks. We laugh. This, too, is true.
Still, he craves my orange juice, I could die for his eggplant. Hunger, Thirst. We could call it love.
“There is no sincerer love than the love of food.” ~ George Bernard Shaw
“Breakfast with Humpty Dumpty” by Michael Cheval.
COME EAT WITH ME AND BE MY LOVE by Cathy Bryant
Come eat with me and be my love and we will buy some plus size pants and gorge on sweet syruped kisses down supermarket food aisles dance until thrown off the premises, my fine eclair, my lemon puff.
Come eat with me and lose your scales and gain lasagne, served with wine, and ripe persimmons, plums and pears my fragrant fruit, oh lover mine, and we will laugh at diet cares and low-fat bread that swiftly stales.
Come eat with me and roll on cake and find crumbs in each other's hair and nibble on as far as we can until, replete, we lie quite bare on our smooth bed of marzipan, my love who dares to shake and bake.
Come eat with me and feel our flesh as soft as custard, warm as toast as comforting as treacle tart as healthy as a hot nut roast, my love, who nestles in my heart - no sell-by date. Forever fresh.
Here’s an appeeling little poem to cheer you up. 🙂
“Orange” by Lu-Yong.
THE ORANGE by Wendy Cope
At lunchtime I bought a huge orange— The size of it made us all laugh. I peeled it and shared it with Robert and Dave— They got quarters and I got a half.
And that orange, it made me so happy, As ordinary things often do Just lately. The shopping. A walk in the park. This is peace and contentment. It’s new.
The rest of the day was quite easy. I did all the jobs on my list And enjoyed them and had some time over. I love you. I’m glad I exist.
Just for you:A perfect evocation of love in anticipation of Valentine’s Day. ♥️
“Les Amoureux” by Marc Chagall(1928).
TOUCH THE AIR SOFTLY
by William Jay Smith
Now touch the air softly, step gently, one, two …
I’ll love you ’til roses are robin’s egg blue;
I’ll love you ’til gravel is eaten for bread,
And lemons are orange, and lavender’s red.
Now touch the air softly, swing gently the broom.
I’ll love you ’til windows are all of a room;
And the table is laid, And the table is bare,
And the ceiling reposes on bottomless air.
I’ll love you ’til heaven rips the stars from his coat,
And the moon rows away in a glass-bottomed boat;
And Orion steps down like a river below,
And earth is ablaze, and oceans aglow.
So touch the air softly, and swing the broom high.
We will dust the grey mountains, and sweep the blue sky:
And I’ll love you as long as the furrow the plough,
As however is ever, and ever is now.
~ from The Girl in Glass: Love Poems (Books & Co., 2002)
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“Lovers with Daisies,” by Marc Chagall (1949-59).
I was totally enchanted by every word of this lyrical gem, which is alternately titled “A Pavane for the Nursery.” Something about, ‘step gently, one, two’ struck me as an ingenuous invitation to delight.
This poem has been set to music by several composers, is a popular choral piece, and is often sung or recited at weddings.
A former U.S. Poet Laureate, William Jay Smith once said, “Great poetry must have its own distinctive music; it must resound with the music of the human psyche,” and this poem certainly bears that out.
Smith favored traditional poetic styles to free verse, hence his use of a rhymed metrical-stanzaic structure here. His pronouncements are charming as well as disarming despite the formal style. Who can resist “the moon rows away in a glass-bottomed boat,” or “we will dust the grey mountains and sweep the blue sky”?
“La Promenade,” by Marc Chagall (1918).
Brooms are symbols of good luck, as they can be used to “sweep away” evil spirits or bad fortune. According to an old Welsh custom, newlyweds should enter their new home by stepping over a broom so luck will follow them. Similarly, if a bride and groom jump over a broom during their marriage ceremony, good luck and fortune will flourish in their union.
Upon reading this poem, I thought immediately of Marc Chagall. After all, he’s considered “the ultimate painter of love.” He masterfully captured the euphoria of love with his levitating lovers, who blissfully float on air, defying gravity, soaring beyond earthly realms as one.
“Bride and Groom of the Eiffel Tower,” by Marc Chagall (1938-39).
His wife Bella was not only the love of his life, but the muse who inspired his best work. He said, “Is it not true that painting and color are inspired by love? In art, as in life, all is possible when conceived in love.”
I thought Chagall’s flying lovers a good match for Smith’s poem, for it is the life-sustaining purity of air that blesses those united in love, enfolding them in their own universe.
“Birthday” by Marc Chagall (1924).
After listening to several renditions of this poem put to music, I decided my favorite is by Minnesota folk musician Peter Mayer. His crisp, warm, fluid acoustic treatment is perfection.
♥️ HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY! ♥️
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The lovely and talented Carol Varsalona is hosting the Roundup at Beyond LiteracyLink. Waltz on over to check out the full menu of poetic goodness being served up around the blogosphere this week. Enjoy your weekend and watch out for cupid’s arrows next week. 🙂
“A clock is a little machine that shuts us out from the wonder of time.” ~ Susan Glaspell
“The sunlight claps the earth, and the moonbeams kiss the sea: what are all these kissings worth, if thou kiss not me?” ~ Percy Bysshe Shelley
Spring is practically here and love is in the air. Why not count the minutes with kisses? 🙂
9.
there are so many tictoc
clocks everywhere telling people
what toctic time it is for
tictic instance five toc minutes toc
past six tic
Spring is not regulated and does
not get out of order nor do
its hands a little jerking move
over numbers slowly
we do not
wind it up it has no weights
springs wheels inside of
its slender self no indeed dear
nothing of the kind.
(So,when kiss Spring comes
we'll kiss each kiss other on kiss the kiss
lips because tic clocks toc don't make
a toctic difference
to kisskiss you and to
kiss me)
~ from erotic poems by E.E. Cummings (W.W. Norton & Co., 2010)
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How’s that for sweet seduction? 🙂
Indeed, Cummings makes a great case for unbridled passion — no regulated constraints, no measured monotony. Just bring on the sensuous delights, surprising, even sudden. For something this delicious, toss your clocks out the window. After all, love has a way of making time stand still.
As you probably know, Cummings wrote many poems celebrating spring and love, often defining one in terms of the other. I think of “O sweet spontaneous earth . . . thou answerst them only with spring,” “we’re alive,dear:it’s(kiss me now)spring!,” “springtime is lovetime and viva sweet love,” or stanzas like this one:
spring!may--
everywhere's here
(with a low high low
and the bird on the bough)
how?why
--we never we know
(so kiss me) shy sweet eagerly
my
most dear
Jama's Alphabet Soup 