Petrarch and Laura

I see I have become a legend, my life, my love,

And her life and death, a legend.

In time it will all be remembered

In time it will all be forgotten

And remembered again, the wrack and refuse

Of all I did and meant and cared for

From fragments painfully regained

That is the nature of legends

And time and life and love.

 

So imagine my embarrassment

That what is known of me, that all I am remembered for

Out of everything I was and did,

Is my worldly love for an earthly girl

Not the symbol of Heaven’s love,

Nor the breeze dancing over the battlemenrs

To shake the laurel leaves,

The golden hills rolling away

From the waters of Bablyon where I sat down,

But the breath that moved in her real breast

And her small, individual, irreproducible smile.

 

Cardiff, 25th July 2017

Posted in Poetry