“Only from the heart can you touch the sky.” Rumi
My Special Guest Writer for February is
Abbie Johnson Taylor.
With Valentine’s Day just around the corner
here’s a poem about love that endures through difficult times.
This poem was inspired by a song from a movie that was released in the late 1990’s. I never heard of the song or the movie until 2005.
this was after my late husband Bill proposed to me.
He was living in Fowler, Colorado, at the time, and I was here in Sheridan, Wyoming. We met through a magazine, and after a long-distance friendship during which we communicated regularly by e-mail and phone and met face to face twice, he sent me a letter, out of the blue, asking me to marry him. This was in January.
A month later, Bill sent me a Valentine care package that included, among other things, a cassette tape of love songs he downloaded from the Internet.
One of these songs was “I Want to Spend My Lifetime Loving You”
from The Mask of Zorro.
It became one of our songs.
Even now, after caring for him at home for six years when two strokes partially paralyzed him, and after I lost him three years ago, I still marvel that a man wanted to spend his lifetime loving me.
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To hear this song, go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yo4AWDELNiY . To hear me read the poem, visit https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/15213189/rise%20fal%20of%20zorro.mp3 .
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THE RISE AND FALL OF MY ZORRO
With cape, hat, mask, rapier,
he rode out of the darkness.
“Take my hand. Dance with me,” he said,
“I want to spend my lifetime loving you,”
but happily-ever-after was not to be.
My hero fell and rose many times.
I felt the glory
until he fell for the last time.
Where there’s love, life begins again.
When life dies, love goes on.
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Abbie Johnson Taylor. Copyright 2016. All Rights Reserved.
Abbie’s Bio:
Abbie Johnson Taylor is the author of a novel and two poetry collections and is working on a memoir. Her work has appeared in Magnets and Ladders and Serendipity Poets Journal. She is visually impaired and lives in Sheridan, Wyoming, where for six years, she cared for her late husband, totally blind and partially paralyzed as a result of two strokes. Please visit her blog at http://abbiescornere.wordpress.com and Website at http://www.abbiejohnsontaylor.com .
Below are links to Abbie’s books:
How to Build a Better Mousetrap: Recollections and Reflections of a Family Caregiver
That’s Life: New and Selected Poems
To hear this song, go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yo4AWDELNiY .
To hear me read the poem, visit https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/15213189/rise%20fal%20of%20zorro.mp3 .
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this post is presented in much appreciation by Lynda McKinney Lambert.
Copyright 2016. All Rights Reserved.
Below: Lynda Lambert, Photo by Bob Lambert: “My Pink Scarf”
Lynda McKinney Lambert. Copyright 2016.. All Rights Reserved.
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