Poem for Friday

Remembrance
By Emily Brontë

Cold in the earth -- and the deep snow piled above thee,
Far, far removed, cold in the dreary grave!
Have I forgot, my only Love, to love thee,
Severed at last by Time's all-severing wave?

Now, when alone, do my thoughts no longer hover
Over the mountains, on that northern shore,
Resting their wings where heath and fern leaves cover
Thy noble heart forever, ever more?

Cold in the earth -- and fifteen wild Decembers,
From those brown hills, have melted into spring;
Faithful, indeed, is the spirit that remembers
After such years of change and suffering!

Sweet Love of youth, forgive, if I forget thee,
While the world's tide is bearing me along;
Other desires and other hopes beset me,
Hopes which obscure, but cannot do thee wrong!

No later light has lightened up my heaven,
No second morn has ever shone for me;
All my life's bliss from thy dear life was given,
All my life's bliss is in the grave with thee.

But, when the days of golden dreams had perished,
And even Despair was powerless to destroy,
Then did I learn how existence could be cherished,
Strengthened, and fed without the aid of joy.

Then did I check the tears of useless passion --
Weaned my young soul from yearning after thine;
Sternly denied its burning wish to hasten
Down to that tomb already more than mine.

And, even yet, I dare not let it languish,
Dare not indulge in memory's rapturous pain;
Once drinking deep of that divinest anguish,
How could I seek the empty world again?

--------

Today I made headway in the acquisition of my all-important fifteen minutes of fame. A New York newspaper reporter e-mailed me, seeking information about the Save Enterprise campaigns; she asked if I would be willing to be interviewed, and -- since I was a fan before I ever reported on Star Trek, since my editor said it was okay and since even the most embarrassing misquote will still bring traffic to the site -- I talked to her on the phone for nearly half an hour while my children, just home from school, screamed in the background. We talked about how UPN and the vast Viacom resources have not been used to advertise the show, how people like my parents who were original series fans and have not watched Voyager or Enterprise's first couple of seasons have been watching recently and the network should have done more to bring back older Trekkies as well as younger audiences, the appeal of the show on a social and sociological level (I also talked about running Kate Mulgrew's fan club and the appeal to women -- all the bright, educated women I met in science, the military, etc.) She asked about the fact that fans would need to raise $32 million to buy another season and the efforts to do so, which I said surprised me, so if she uses that quote I am betting I get hate mail tomorrow calling me a false fan for not being willing to empty my children's college funds to save the series; I did mention that four generations of my family have at some point watched the original series. It will be interesting to see if she quotes me and which aspects! (ETA: Posted next entry, f-locked because of real name issues.)

The rest of my day, of course, was not nearly so exciting. I had hoped to lure into lunch and Paul Bettany but she was not feeling well (hope you are better K!) so when my mother called, after I had already eaten lunch, I met her at Barnes and Noble where she bought me the Russell Crowe cover March 2005 GQ (the wonderful , my source for so many Russell goodies, has a transcript here, and Murph has the photos here). We picked up a bunch of books for my kids, too, including the Spiderwick series and two books by Brian Jacques that aren't Redwall -- looks like they're both sailing-themed, which made me smile as I spent this morning wallowing in last year's love, Patrick O'Brian. I think I had deliberately needed to get some distance from the books after I finished them, in part not to mourn for the series and in part not to mourn for a whole bunch of things I associated with the series, and I was amazed how good it felt to reread all the highlights of The Reverse of the Medal, one of my favorites of the 20 -- though really there are no weak links (in fact the first is probably the one I enjoyed least and they got progressively better). I got all sniffly in places but in a good way.

Otherwise it was a typical Thursday: had to get up early because it's 's early day in the office when they phone conference with Bangalore, had the usual carpool insanity after school with one child taking Hebrew and the other violin -- they get no down time at all, I let them run around when they first got home but then they both had homework to finish tonight after dinner which they hate, and older son "remembered" at the last minute that he had reading to do halfway through watching an episode of Highlander with me (he takes fencing and I knew he'd love it). The living room is an absolute pigsty and it's all their stuff and I don't even know where to put 3/4 of it in their rooms but of course I couldn't make them clean it up tonight, so I guess it stays that way tomorrow. They have a half-day of school, and older son is going home with one of the kids in his science group to work on their big project, so hopefully younger son will want to invite someone over to play or I may have a hard time getting any work or packing done! We are going to my sister's for a couple of days this weekend and into Manhattan on Monday to visit friends if any of their schedules permit it; everyone I know seems overscheduled even though it's a holiday!

Anyway, Christian Bale fans, go look at this lovely new drawing of him by my beloved Kim Schultz. And tell me if you will think I am a loser because I got all excited that my mother got me the annotated, illustrated Da Vinci Code -- in my defense I had read and reviewed the book before it was a phenomenon anywhere -- I read Holy Blood, Holy Grail in my early teens and have always been into this stuff, so this is at least a long-term dorky pleasure, not a trendy one. And hey, if I do end up in the newspaper and do not sound like a total jerk and you happen to live in New York, could someone pick me up and mail me a copy? *g* Thanks!


The edge of the thaw at Huntley Meadows.