Invisible Gypsy

So much evil in this world and so many lives taken in those days.

Love and respect.

"Mary Lou Wingate, as slightly built
And as hard to break as a rapier blade
Bristol's daughter and Wingate's bride
Never quite well since the last child died
But staring at pain with courteous eyes
When the pain outwits it
The body dies...."

--Stephen Vincent Benet from "John Brown's Body"

That's all I can remember of a poem I read sixty years ago. Your poem somehow reached way inside me and came up with that memory, so what I can say with assurance is that you're a *real* poet, which is a rarity these days. I think it was Auden who wrote that "mad Ireland hurt Yates into poetry." Or words to that effect.

I tend to write my best stuff when I'm hurting, when somehow the pain leaks out and splatters all over the page and it's a rorscharch  staring me in the eye and eventually resolves itself into a poem. That's how I'm experiencing this pain/poem of yours, and it also connects with *my* pain.

This is not a critique. Just an observation, a sharing of how your poem reached out across time and space and demanded some kind of response from a guy who's nearly eighty years old and has been around the heartache block a ton of times.

Keep at it. You're worth it.

I always save your comments when you leave them. They're very dear to me. I appreciate your feedback more than I know how to express

ty so much. Hug.

Always 💙