I attended a star gazing session on the weekend and it was a wonderful night. I have always wanted to lie under the night sky and look at the stars and just be there. How starry nights are romanticised in movies! Its cold and the bright twinkle in the sky is a gentle reminder and assurance that the best things in life are always in front of us, only we need to see them through the dust speckled invisible glasses we wear all the time. I always think that the stars have a mysterious charm over us. How many of us succumb to this charm? In fact many don't even register its presence. I felt so good to be there and, because I tend to get emotional over nature's many wonders, I couldn't stop tears streaming my eyes.
After spending an entire night and early morning spotting comets, constellations, star clusters and Jupiter, I felt I could remain glued to the telescopes all night and day long. An incredible experience of my life. Later in the evening, I picked up 'The Selected Poetry of Edna St. Vincent Millay', and her lyrical verse on nature, love and sorrow resonated strongly with me. She has a way with words that captivates the most basic human feelings with such ease. When she writes, 'I will be the gladdest thing/ Under the sun!/ I will touch a hundred flowers/ and not pick one', I know she must have been such a kind soul to have penned such words. I feel like she's speaking to me through her poetry. She seems like a friend who writes to me baring her soul, and wishes for me to reciprocate back to her through lyrics like her.
I recall a place
Where a plum-tree grew;
There you lifted up your face,
And blossoms covered you.
Such a simple verse, and me who has never seen a plum orchard somehow still imagine a silhouette standing amid hazy images of an orchard. Such is the power of poetry. There is something charismatic and essentially magnetic that draws me to her words. She appeals to the woman in me. The fire that burns bright and ignites with words such as these:
The fabric of my faithful love
No power shall dim or ravel
Whilst I stay here,- but oh, my dear,
If I should ever travel!
Stars like her are so rare to have lived on the earth. I am so glad for the happiness both Vincent Millay and the starry night gave me when I most needed it.
After spending an entire night and early morning spotting comets, constellations, star clusters and Jupiter, I felt I could remain glued to the telescopes all night and day long. An incredible experience of my life. Later in the evening, I picked up 'The Selected Poetry of Edna St. Vincent Millay', and her lyrical verse on nature, love and sorrow resonated strongly with me. She has a way with words that captivates the most basic human feelings with such ease. When she writes, 'I will be the gladdest thing/ Under the sun!/ I will touch a hundred flowers/ and not pick one', I know she must have been such a kind soul to have penned such words. I feel like she's speaking to me through her poetry. She seems like a friend who writes to me baring her soul, and wishes for me to reciprocate back to her through lyrics like her.
I recall a place
Where a plum-tree grew;
There you lifted up your face,
And blossoms covered you.
Such a simple verse, and me who has never seen a plum orchard somehow still imagine a silhouette standing amid hazy images of an orchard. Such is the power of poetry. There is something charismatic and essentially magnetic that draws me to her words. She appeals to the woman in me. The fire that burns bright and ignites with words such as these:
The fabric of my faithful love
No power shall dim or ravel
Whilst I stay here,- but oh, my dear,
If I should ever travel!
Stars like her are so rare to have lived on the earth. I am so glad for the happiness both Vincent Millay and the starry night gave me when I most needed it.
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