(how it came to be writ)

Once upon a time a young would-be poet turned
Union executive member attended a T.U.C. course
At Oxford`s University College (at which Shelley 
had - for a minimal time - studied) and struck up a
friendship - based on their mutual love of poetry -
 with the beautiful secretary of the tutor. Their after - 
lecture rambles and chats became longer and more
close until eventually (perhaps inevitably)  the lovely
charm and beauty of the secretary sparked the poem:

 

 

GERALDINE

If you knew Geraldine 

You`d worship there
Not just the loveliness of her,
At how, under the sheer sheen of her hair
Her eyes rest, wide, apart,
As through their gathered darkness subtly dart
The glimpse-lights of her soul`s dear beauteousness.
But stilled to a reverence in your mind you`d bow
To all the calm peace that`s set
Between the twin-templed compass of her brow.
And still would wonder yet
At how
Her voices` fresh lilt-melody tune,
Across the pebbly syllables of speech
Purls, clear as the dell-streams reach,
Under the secret quietness of the moon…

If you knew Geraldine

 

The course came to an end and Geraldine, pleased
with her poem, agreed to meet him for one last
time in London and,  presenting him with a poetry
 anthology, asked him to always remember a poem
 she`d marked for him and sadly they parted company.

A week later they met at the Lyceum theatre in 
London (which was - at that time - temporarily 
converted to an ornately classy dance - hall) and
to the music of all those wonderful sixties tunes
the poet spent  a memorably romantic and cosy
evening in the company of the loveliest of girls.

It ended of course (as all earthly happiness must) with
the long, sad walk along the Strand to the tube station
and the parting down the symbolically opposite arms
 of Charing Cross never in this present life to meet again.

(`What brought all this on`? you may ask...Well, last night
I heard an old record of Frank Ifield singing `I remember
You` and turned to her marked poem once again.It was:) 

Go from me. Yet I feel that I shall stand 
Henceforward in thy shadow. Nevermore 
Alone upon the threshold of my door 
Of individual life, I shall command 
The uses of my soul, nor lift my hand 
Serenely in the sunshine as before, 
Without the sense of that which I forbore, .. 
Thy touch upon the palm. The widest land 
Doom takes to part us, leaves thy heart in mine 
With pulses that beat double. What I do 
And what I dream include thee, as the wine 
Must taste of its own grapes. And when I sue 
God for myself, He hears that name of thine, 
And sees within my eyes, the tears of two.

BY ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING

(Life!)