Monday, March 27, 2017

Love after Love (by Derek Walcott, 1930-2017)

The time will come
when, with elation,
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror,
and each will smile at the other’s welcome,
and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who has loved you
all your life, whom you ignored
for another; who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,
the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.

1 comment:

  1. What a superb and lucid description of coming home to oneself, of the dawning realisation that one is one's very life. There is no other lover.

    And the form and rhythm support this so serenely: the way the lines expand and contract, like a breath; the simple words which punctuate the verse: "eat", "sit". Anyone can understand this.

    Being is easy, and being is love.

    Thank you for sharing this, David. It's a gem.

    And thank you Derek Walcott.

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