Week of Love: Thursday's Love Poem
For Thursday I have a bit of a naughty poem. (But please be kind to me... I didn't get much sleep. I have sick babies. A lack of sleep for me means a few things: I could make no sense, I could be quite strange and find things extremely funny that the common sense of humor does not, and, finally, I make a lot of typos and my vocabulary is reduced to thingamabobs, whatchamacallits and youknowthatthings.)
To His Coy Mistress
Had we but world enough, and time,
This coyness, lady, were no crime.
We would sit down and think which way
To walk, and pass our long love's day;
Thou by the Indian Ganges' side
Shouldst rubies find; I by the tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love you ten years before the Flood;
And you should, if you please, refuse
Till the conversion of the Jews.
My vegetable love should grow
Vaster than empires, and more slow.
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze;
Two hundred to adore each breast,
But thirty thousand to the rest;
An age at least to every part,
And the last age should show your heart.
For, lady, you deserve this state,
Nor would I love at lower rate.
But at my back I always hear
Time's winged chariot hurrying near;
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity.
Thy beauty shall no more be found,
Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound
My echoing song; then worms shall try
That long preserv'd virginity,
And your quaint honour turn to dust,
And into ashes all my lust.
The grave's a fine and private place,
But none I think do there embrace.
Now therefore, while the youthful hue
Sits on thy skin like morning dew,
And while thy willing soul transpires
At every pore with instant fires,
Now let us sport us while we may;
And now, like am'rous birds of prey,
Rather at once our time devour,
Than languish in his slow-chapp'd power.
Let us roll all our strength, and all
Our sweetness, up into one ball;
And tear our pleasures with rough strife
Thorough the iron gates of life.
Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run.
-Andrew Marvell
This poem makes me laugh because it makes me think of just how easy to predict how a man's mind works. This poem is essentially one man's argument to get into a woman's pants... now rather than later. The argument starts out as a praise of her beauty and how much he would like to spend eternity just caught up in it, "A hundred years should go to praise Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze; Two hundred to adore each breast. But thirty thousand to the rest." Read the poem a little further and you find the reason for his adoration. He is trying to talk a woman into sleeping with him. Life is too short. Death sneaks up us and we grow old. Nothing lasts. And now the point of his love poem: let's make the most of time and and get to down to business. Carpe Diem. Seize the Day.
I laugh because men have not changed their tactics much in the almost 350 years since this poem was written. I also think that it reminds me how simple my husband is. I have rough days, clean up baby poo, wipe baby food off my clothes, try to convince a 3 year old to wear something that matches and isn't made out of tulle, and at the end of the day I feel as though I need a massage therapist, a facial, a bubble bath and a team of hairdressers and make-up up artists to feel even remotely attractive. But my husband, save but for very rare and stressful occassions, can look at me washing dishes or wiping snot and just like that want to seize a moment and enjoy... well... um... me.
hmm... Awkward conversation..
.
But do let your husband seize some moments. He really is that simple.
Hope that wasn't too weird. I did warn you about what tired does to me. Ha!
To His Coy Mistress
Had we but world enough, and time,
This coyness, lady, were no crime.
We would sit down and think which way
To walk, and pass our long love's day;
Thou by the Indian Ganges' side
Shouldst rubies find; I by the tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love you ten years before the Flood;
And you should, if you please, refuse
Till the conversion of the Jews.
My vegetable love should grow
Vaster than empires, and more slow.
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze;
Two hundred to adore each breast,
But thirty thousand to the rest;
An age at least to every part,
And the last age should show your heart.
For, lady, you deserve this state,
Nor would I love at lower rate.
But at my back I always hear
Time's winged chariot hurrying near;
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity.
Thy beauty shall no more be found,
Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound
My echoing song; then worms shall try
That long preserv'd virginity,
And your quaint honour turn to dust,
And into ashes all my lust.
The grave's a fine and private place,
But none I think do there embrace.
Now therefore, while the youthful hue
Sits on thy skin like morning dew,
And while thy willing soul transpires
At every pore with instant fires,
Now let us sport us while we may;
And now, like am'rous birds of prey,
Rather at once our time devour,
Than languish in his slow-chapp'd power.
Let us roll all our strength, and all
Our sweetness, up into one ball;
And tear our pleasures with rough strife
Thorough the iron gates of life.
Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run.
-Andrew Marvell
This poem makes me laugh because it makes me think of just how easy to predict how a man's mind works. This poem is essentially one man's argument to get into a woman's pants... now rather than later. The argument starts out as a praise of her beauty and how much he would like to spend eternity just caught up in it, "A hundred years should go to praise Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze; Two hundred to adore each breast. But thirty thousand to the rest." Read the poem a little further and you find the reason for his adoration. He is trying to talk a woman into sleeping with him. Life is too short. Death sneaks up us and we grow old. Nothing lasts. And now the point of his love poem: let's make the most of time and and get to down to business. Carpe Diem. Seize the Day.
I laugh because men have not changed their tactics much in the almost 350 years since this poem was written. I also think that it reminds me how simple my husband is. I have rough days, clean up baby poo, wipe baby food off my clothes, try to convince a 3 year old to wear something that matches and isn't made out of tulle, and at the end of the day I feel as though I need a massage therapist, a facial, a bubble bath and a team of hairdressers and make-up up artists to feel even remotely attractive. But my husband, save but for very rare and stressful occassions, can look at me washing dishes or wiping snot and just like that want to seize a moment and enjoy... well... um... me.
hmm... Awkward conversation..
.
But do let your husband seize some moments. He really is that simple.
Hope that wasn't too weird. I did warn you about what tired does to me. Ha!