Sunday, May 24, 2009

after long silence


i love to visit reya's blog every day for her very cool photography and her deep and real insights into human nature and the experiencing of life. yesterday morning i read a piece by her on the benefits of middle age.

her writing obviously got me thinking. so there i was edging a garden bed out front of my home and a song came into my head called "after long silence". english majors reading this will say "hey, that's not a song, that's a poem by yeats" and you're right. but i have heard it rendered by cleo laine the great british jazz singer and that's what i heard in my head. but why that song? so i looked up the lyrics / poem and here's what you see.

after long silence

speech after long silence; it is right,
all other lovers being estranged or dead,
unfriendly lamplight hid under its shade,
the curtains drawn upon unfriendly night,
that we descant and yet again descant
upon the supreme theme of art and song:
bodily decrepitude is wisdom; young
we loved each other and were ignorant.

william butler yeats (from "the winding stair and other poems" 1933)

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