I have a silver shamrock
salvaged from that Irish bar
they tore down
to make way for a dorm.
And, half a dozen postcards
that he mailed to me from Europe;
I didn't get them
till after he was home.
I have a blurry picture
of me wearing white and terror
just before I took
vows and a ring.
I have a dark-eyed daughter.
She has a hearth and father.
And, he and I, between us
have 13.
Thursday, May 15, 2014
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
About Me
- Maude Lynn
- Anybody who has survived his childhood has enough information about life to last him the rest of his days. ---Flannery O'Connor
8 comments:
happy anniversary...
ours is in 10 days...
that silver shamrock would be a very cool souvenier...
Duh @ me. Thankfully Brian Miller got here first, to explain what the 13 meant, cos I was lost. Congratulations to you and Mister Luck Out.
They tore down O'Connell's? O well--tempis fugit and all that. Terror is what I wore at all my weddings--more appropriate than orange blossoms.
of course that's the luckiest number ~
I was going to ask, if you had 13 children between the two of you or 13 photos of your terror, but like Fireblossom said I wouldn't have known the real meaning if Brian hadn't commented...
This is an achievement that should not be taken lightly - given the times we live in.
Congratulations.
My understanding --- properly linking the adjective back to the closest noun --- is that you are saying that together you have 13 fathers ... which would mean that your parents were a mess of divorces and remarriages, so you probably have had a rocky road together. Also, something may have happened to you at age 13 that could have caused you to struggle in adult relationships. Certainly there is an undertone of the general unluckiness that the number 13 represents. Smart contrast in the first line, as a shamrock is an almost-4-leaf-clover, so you were so close to being lucky in love. Alas, things fell short of the perfection you had hoped for, just like the letters that arrived a bit too late to do you any good.
Tearing down a bar and replacing it with a dorm is like destroying your fun, wild days and replacing them with a home and responsibility. Like in the last line of your first stanza, you mean two things: one, that he arrived home, but two, that he became your home. This is both good and bad. Comfortable and frustrating.
I think the line that says "that he mailed to me from Europe" could have an embedded sexual meaning (you're up). "I didn't get them" has multiple meanings: they didn't arrive in time, you didn't understand them, they weren't all for you.
This is by far my favorite part:
"I have a blurry picture
of me wearing white and terror"
Again, I think there are sexual undertones here: "just before I took"
I'll stop. I just really enjoy a poem that uses the magic of line breaks to convey extra meaning. Thanks for giving my head something to play with.
congrats--very charming--k/
Post a Comment