i carry your heart with me

A good love poem, though it may be addressed to one
person, is always meant to be overheard by other people. . . .
These are private words addressed to you in public.
—T. S. Eliot

I've had love on the brain for the last few days. It's hard not to, this time of year.  For the most part, it's been rather enjoyable to wallow in the trappings of "love day" – especially since I love a good love song.  And even though I don't have a Valentine, in the strictest sense of the word, there are a lot of people in the world whom I love. Dearly. And I liked pondering and acknowledging some of those treasured relationships.

I was looking online for some good love poetry this week, and I found a new favorite. It's by e.e. cummings, which is not at all surprising. I love that man's words. The beginning almost feels like too much, to the point that I wonder if he is being just a bit facetious. It kind of makes me want to say, "Really, e? (Can I call you e?)  Don't you think that's just a bit too gushy?" But apparently that's the way he wants it. He never listens to me… 

Anyway, here it is. Commentary to follow.

[i carry your heart with me(i carry it in]
e.e. cummings

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in

my heart)i am never without it(anywhere

i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done

by only me is your doing,my darling)

i fear

no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want

no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)

and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant

and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows

higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)

and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

Once you get beyond the creepy literal image of that first line, the metaphor is beautiful.  All that he is stems from his heart, and inside that heart is his love's heart. So really, the beloved's heart is the root of all that he is and all that he does. 

And look at that "i fear" just hanging out alone in the middle of the first stanza. Does it belong with the thought above, or the thought below, or both? We get the sense that love can be both a scary, all-engrossing, self-consuming feeling and a very secure feeling at the same time. What a feat of poetic loveliness!

Then there's the final stanza: "here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud and the sky of the sky of a tree called life."  I adore the repetition of the "thing inside a thing" – the root in the root, the heart in the heart.  And the secret of that growing tree, of the root that supports it and the bud that grows season after season and the sky that it reaches toward – the secret of his life's beginning, middle and end – is that he carries his love's heart inside his own.  Protecting it and holding it and making it a motivating force. It is, in fact, what is "keeping the stars apart," keeping his world from falling in on itself and being destroyed. It's love.

I feel like I'm not done, like there's more to say here – a personal connection to this piece. Something about wanting to be whatever a moon has always meant to someone, or hoping to find someone who is, for me, whatever a sun will always sing. But today is not the day for me to say it. So I'll simply say:
Thank you, e. (I've decided to call him e.) That was just beautiful.

PS- Google "TS Eliot A Dedication to My Wife." You'll like it. Part of the quote above this post is from that poem.