If you are not a beautiful creature
Is there love for you?
When the world appears bewitched by youth and eternal moment’s boiled to infuse
Who shall love?
Who shall love?
The imperfect and technically “past it”
When beautiful felt like;
The sound of heals clicking on marble
Then slippers
Then bare feet
Then silence
No attention for a certain shape, age, gaze
Consolation crows, grow your mind
Crack jokes
Have a sense of humor
Laugh at yourself.
Long before, boys fell in love with me first;
Because of an hourglass
A firmness
A tightness
A willingness
The measure of hips
And then later, aserbic wit
I say ignore the rules
Climb trees at sixty, chomping on cigar
Wear polkadots, rolling dice on roof tops
Make love in bramble hedges and countertops
We talk of politics and deep sea diving, the need for conscience, passion and chocolate biscuits
You didn’t need a perfect pair of legs or a tiny waist
Eventually you wanted a woman of four seasons
Who couldn’t hold her alcohol anymore and streaked across the lawn
A girl of seventy and four, mayflies buzzing in our ears
Who still beat you at arm wrestling and sang like an angel with grey hair
Opening her robe to your eager devour
For once upon, you were a youthful coward, chasing empty smiles
And now you lay in a woman’s arms marveling at her lines
The black and blue, and those she fought hard for, birthing children
Crossing her face like stars
More beautiful for their dance
On skin long past its prime and so fine
For a constellation is music over time
Then and only then, love breathes eternal
Oh so beautiful…
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This is a beautiful ode to ordinary people who are neither young nor good-looking to the dispassionate eye. We are all beautiful to those who matter.
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This is just wonderful, made me tear up a little.
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Wonderful! And, it reminded me of this favorite:
Warning by Jenny Joseph
When I am an old woman I shall wear purple
With a red hat which doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me.
And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves
And satin sandals, and say we’ve no money for butter.
I shall sit down on the pavement when I’m tired
And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells
And run my stick along the public railings
And make up for the sobriety of my youth.
I shall go out in my slippers in the rain
And pick flowers in other people’s gardens
And learn to spit.
You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat
And eat three pounds of sausages at a go
Or only bread and pickle for a week
And hoard pens and pencils and beermats and things in boxes.
But now we must have clothes that keep us dry
And pay our rent and not swear in the street
And set a good example for the children.
We must have friends to dinner and read the papers.
But maybe I ought to practice a little now?
So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised
When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.
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Reblogged this on cabbagesandkings524 and commented:
TheFeatheredSleep – when love breaths eternal
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Breathtaking! This is what I live for – love like this!
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Wonderful, Candice. We are all lovable and deserve love. The task is finding the person to see the beauty within and in turn recognizing the internal beauty of that one as well. This is amazing, my friend. Hope you are well. 💗💗💗
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I say that you’ve captured the essence of perfect, and meaningful life. So well done.
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My goal is to ‘age’ disgracefully respectable! I have decided to discard the shackles of what is deemed fit and proper for an older person. Finally, I have grown into myself and am comfortable in my own being 🙂
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Beautifully done. The memories of young love strengthen the ageing version
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Love to you. Your skin. And the contents therein.
Kindness – Robert.
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This is so magnificent, Candice. ❤
"Crossing her face like stars
More beautiful for their dance
On skin long past its prime and so fine
For a constellation is music over time
Then and only then, love breathes eternal"
I love that!!
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A Delightful poem! Truly a lovely composed ending to this piece too.
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Candice, nicely done. Like many, I marvel at the lengthy marriage of Barbara and George Bush. She was a sincere soul and had a life well lived, cutting up until the very end. Keith
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I love this, Candice – a wonderfully written ode to those of us who are well past our prime. It’s the ever-young essence that matters.
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Love you 💓
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“a woman of four seasons”
I love that line. Beautiful poem.
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Thanks so very much 💓
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