A poem came back to me today. Wordsworth's Phantom of Delight. I told you that after the fire, I forgot everything that I had learned. Phantom was a poem that a boyfriend in high school gave to me and after I was married to a jealous future ex for a few months, I bought a short anthology of poetry and artwork. (It was purchased from Nordstrom with a gift certificate from my mom. It smelled of roses.) The anthology had Phantom in it with a pretty lady depicted next to it. I memorized it. When I married my ex, he convinced me that I was too pretentious and should abandon my love of art and poetry and getting the book was a rebellion of sorts. Memorizing the poem was another rebellion since a former boyfriend had given me a copy of it and I'd had to throw it away when we got married. Since the fire, I have looked the poem up and it just wasn't resonating with me. It came today to my brain while I was listening to Pachelbel's Canon, another song that I loved back in the day. I was really happy and relieved. I was told that it would all come back, but I didn't know when. I hope it returns in droves! But where did it all go? When my snowglobe of a life was shaken, that box was completely emptied. Fortunately, it was emptied, but not burnt up. The debris is being put back into the boxes and rendered useful to me once more!
I wonder if people who suffer from memory loss feel in any way like I have. Knowing that something that I loved was lost was very hard on me. There are other things that are still gone and I know what they are, but I know that God willing that I have no problems that they will come back.
Emily is coming back, too. I folded laundry and wore my favourite quilt over my shoulders as her bird poems rustled in my head this afternoon. God gave a loaf to every bird, Hope is the thing with feathers-- but my favorite of hers speaks of the hour of lead. That also came back. The hour of lead-- that was how I felt as my house was burning and it lasted perhaps until a couple of weeks ago. Part of me woke up when my house was burning-- I felt like Sleeping Beauty as my sh-- burned and I re-processed my life.
Is it OK that I am coming out of the hour of lead only two months later? I have thought at times that I was shaking it, but having something so special come back to me tells me that I really am shaking the numbness, but at the same time, what I woke up to is still there, so I know it is real. I just really wish I didn't have to go through a fire to get to where I am in the process of going.
Couldn't my destiny have greeted me at my favorite store or bakery, instead, and without the sirens and flashing lights?
Would I have recognized it any other way? I hope that there is good for the Crumpets in this and that it is an easy good, not something like, something terrible is destined to happen so the fire will teach them a resiliency to make them tougher. I've stated before, however, that the good will not come from acquiring things-- the intangibles even now make me feel happy, but nothing will replace the photographs!
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