Love the Sweetest, Angel Love - Quotes and Poems from Friends and Strangers

What is Love, if not a trip to Paradise? What is Paradise if not the place/time or time/place beyond place, beyond time, spent with those we love? So here's another Valentine's Day post, one in a series, with love poems and beautiful words of reassurance, compassion, and affection received from friends and strangers.

Jessica and Juan Cardenas celebrate with guests, February 6, 2016

First, friends.... Last weekend, I hosted the second anniversary party for the love-birds, Jessica Wilson Cardenas and Juan Cardenas at my home, a garden-party on a beautiful, sunny afternoon, filled of affection, music, poetry, and joy....

Jessica Wilson Cardenas and Juan Cardenas with their brand new T-shirts "Feel This Love"

We read poetry, and my poem "On Divine Commedy and Ice Cream" was inspired by illuminations for Dante's Il Paradiso by Giovanni di Paolo, a contemporary of Giotto. One of our guests, Victor Sotomayor recorded my reading and made a beautiful video of the performance, with a mini-lecture introduction about Il Paradiso and what it means for us.




On Divine Comedy and Ice-Cream

My Muse has chocolate eyes and a goatee.
Disabled by grief, he looks for me in the dark,
touching. His hands outline the contour
of my hips as he sighs and says “that’s right”
in this deep baritone of his, the sweetest of voices. 

What next? I wonder as we sit on the leather sofa
sticky in the heat, eat almonds and ice cream,
watch silly comedies about aliens and time 
machines, friends being excellent  to each other... 
as we leaf through the thick volume 
of other Comedy, the Divine one: 
Il Paradiso illustrated by Giovanni di Paolo,
medieval illuminations for the end of time.

Submerged  in the Earth’s shadow, the Moon 
is the haven for the likes of us, inconstant,
waxing and waning, not keeping their vows.
Dante and Beatrix, the poet and his beloved,
rise up to Mercury and Venus, the Garden 
of Earthly Delights where we stay 
as they ascend from the Fourth Sphere
of the Sun through the Eight of Fixed Stars.

Left behind, we sigh and look up at them
floating to meet the wise, the virtuous, martyrs,
saints, the multitude of angels in Primum Mobile
and the blessed, don’t forget the blessed
of the Tenth Sphere, the divine Empyrean –
in the heart of Paradise where gold rays 
of light always permeate everything, 
where saints sleep in rose petal pods, 

like babies by their mothers, 
or splash in and out of the waters of grace,
the river of serenity that flows under
the buzzing of heavenly bees, making 
timeless honey – sweet, translucent, 
gold honey, only honey, forever and beyond time, 
honey….

(C) 2016 by Maja Trochimczyk

After this visit to Paradise, Juan played some of his songs, Jessica read her sensuous poem about Grapefruit, mmm, so goood... and we had such a blessed afternoon, in Paradise, the Garden of Earthly Delights...

Me encanta las toronjas,

the blossom of fragrance makes its way into my hands,
unfolds like petals upon my skin.
The weight of its shape is heavy
with intention,
to release its galaxy, an ointment of pleasure
sparkling in a rippling tide. 
This is the fruit of the sun, 
its sunshine dripping off of my lips,
squeezed into realness, of comfort.
Juicy nature jugs me from the inside,
pulling my belly up into my throat,
until it lays flat on my tongue.
so few things are as gratifying as this orb of citrus,
so perfectly awake and wide for me to taste.
Ah, me encanta la fruta hecha de las manos 
de los dioses, y tan perfecto en circulo
como las caras de la luna y sol.
Yo toco el sabor con la esperanza
del mundo donde la gente hacen la paz de simplicidad 
y la naturalesa de Pachamamma por siempre,
donde nuestros labios nunca tienen sed
y las pansitas viven llenas. 
Oh let it be, that this dream will see us through 

to our eternity.             - Amen y por siempre, Amen. 

(c) by Jessica Wilson Cardenas

Then the "love-birds" had two cakes with two candles each, for the second year together: a white cheesecake for the day, and dark chocolate ganache cake for the night... Sweet, with a multitude of fruit, that belongs in paradise where every one is loved and loves.

Thank God for friends for all times... Several weeks earlier I received an invitation to participate in an email "chain letter" - something I studiously managed to avoid for so long! Despite the curses and threats and vain promises made by authors of missives assuring me of good or bad luck, depending on whether I forwarded the silly note within five minutes to twenty people.  Here's an example. I did not email it to 20 people; instead I'm posting it here:

This is for u x Read till the end! I sent an angel to watch over you last night, but it came back and asked "why?" The angel said, "angels don't watch over angels!" twenty angels are in your world. Ten are sleeping, nine of them are playing and one is reading this message. The universe has seen you struggling with some things and says it over. a blessing is coming your way. If you believe in Karma send this message to 14 friends including me, if I don't get it back I guess I'm not one of them. As soon as you get 5 replies, someone you love will quietly surprise you... Not joking. Pass this message on. Please don't ignore it. you are being tested and Karma is going to fix two big things tonight in your favor. If you believe in Karma drop everything and pass it on TOMORROW WILL BE THE BEST DAY OF YOUR LIFE. DON'T BREAK THIS. SEND THIS TO 14 FRIENDS IN 10 MINUTES IT'S NOT THAT HARD. WHOEVER SENT THIS TO YOU MUST CARE ABOUT YOU!!!

That other one was different, there were no threats of "breaking the chain" and punishments for it. Instead, it entailed sending a friendly, encouraging note to just one person and inviting twenty to do the same, so one person would receive twenty notes of friendship and encouragement from complete strangers... This seems interesting... what would people come up with? So I sent my favorite Irish blessing of light, and waited...

May the blessing of Light be on you. 

Light without and light within, 

May the blessed sunlight shine on you. 

And warm your heart till it glows like a great peat fire...

Not much later, I received my first words of encouragement. I like this phrase so much I put it on my own "candy rose" - covered entirely in water droplets - and sent it to the poet who blessed me with this insight:

Then, I got a poem by Rumi:

Beyond ideas of

right and wrong

there is a field,

I will meet

you there.

                                ~  Rumi

from Maria Elena B. Meyer

Another poet I hardly know send me a quote and his own poem:

Here is a quote and "short" play-with-a-sweet-word poem by me to you.

 “Time is too slow for those who wait, too swift for those who fear, too long for those who grieve, too short for those who rejoice, but for those who love, time is eternity.” – Henry Van Dyke

*************************

SHORT AND SWEET

by Ken Frankel

Butter ....is sweet!

Ice cream ....is sweet!

Beauty ...is sweet!

Love is the sweetest.

*************************

Hard to argue with that final statement!. Finally, a poem from Lulu Abramian came my way:

Measure

Do not measure up

Life is not quantity

Value what you have

Life is quality

Where you are going

Will always be there

Treasure the moments

Will help you get there

 By: Lulu Abramian

Finally, I got a comment from a poet, who decided against participating in the email chain, but sent me her favorite prayer:

The Lord is my shepherd, 

I shall not want;...

in green pastures...

beside still waters 

He restoreth my soul.

While looking for the text of the Irish Blessing of Light cited above, I came across a full text of what appears to be a folk-song, of love, connections to nature, the sun, the living things, and the earth and, in short, connection.  People are social animals, without other people they wither and die inside. The connection of love is vital for life. Maybe that's why the two words in English differ only by one consonant?

Here's the entire Irish Blessing Text from a Folk Song:

1. May the blessing of Light be on you
Light without and light within,
May the blessed sunlight shine on you
And warm your heart till it glows like
A great peat fire, so that the stranger
May come and warm himself at it,
And also a friend.
And may the light shine out of the two eyes of you,
Like a candle set in two windows of a house,
Bidding the wanderer to come in out of the storm.

2. And may the blessing of the Rain be on you
The soft sweet rain. May it fall upon your spirit
So that all the little flowers may spring up,
And shed their sweetness on the air.
And may the blessing of the Great Rains be on
You, may they beat upon your spirit
And wash it fair and clean,
And leave there many a shining pool
Where the blue of heaven shines,
And sometimes a star.

3. And may the blessing of the Earth be on you
The great round earth; may you ever have
A kindly greeting for them you pass
As you're going along the roads.
May the earth be soft under you when you rest upon it,
Tired at the end of the day,
And may it rest easy over you when,
At the last, you lay out under it;
May it rest so lightly over you,
That your soul may be out from under it quickly,
And up, and off, and on its way to God.

Isn't it delightful, and full of sweet, gracious sentiments, connecting us to the earth, the air, the sunlight? Yes, I say, as I celebrate my new Italian nickname, courtesy of erudite and wise poet and editor Margaret Ute Seine: "Una Donna Solare" - the Sunny Lady....

And here we are, all smiles: sisters in spirit, in poetry, in art... after the LoveLoveLove reading (Spectrum 3, edited by Don Kingfisher Campbell) in Pasadena, with the inspired Ambika Talwar, who knows secrets of ancient wisdom and unties hidden knots... she had 22 photos in the book, I had just one poem ("Many Happy Returns"), and a bell, let's not forget the bell....

Thanksgiving in Paris with Leonardo, Swans, Music, and Rain

Self-portrait with Leonardo at the Louvre, November 23, 2015.

And they said, aren't you afraid to go? To Paris? Now? After the explosions? Bloodied bodies in the streets? For Thanksgiving? This is how we show we are not afraid, we will not let them win, whoever they are, these men with guns, tall, strong-muscled men without love, with guns, always more guns. But I sought something else, something to be thankful for. The Louvre was there, waiting.

Oh, how we long 

for the tender arms of mother -

safe touch of azure

And there is more, that other half smile of John the Baptist.  Leonardo's mysterious twin.

look at the clouds 

don't get distracted by things below 

he says, pointing at the sky

Today, I'm thankful for paintings. Leonardo in black and blue made my day.  And so did that flustered angel, excitedly bomb-diving the Blessed Virgin with the good news, hers and ours, the real Good News: Peace be with you. God lives in your heart.  Look how surprised she is, how unprepared. Aren't we all? To know that there is only love, only One Love that links us, sentient beings, from the bee to the bison, from dolphin to the duck, with the cruel, violent humans hiding somewhere in-between?  When will we feel that all human beings are part of us; that all trees grow our roots, all skylarks sing our songs? 

Yes, I did see long guns in Paris. Groups of four or five soldiers in camouflage fatigues, walking along the umbrella lines waiting to get inside the Notre Dame Cathedral.  Why did we stand for over an hour in the cold?

umbrellas blossom

on the cathedral square 

without gunshots

Maybe to hear the bells ringing at noon, and, again at one o'clock.

 a new hour -

cathedral bells are ringing

under clouded skies

The Cathedral

waves of song
bounce off the cobblestones
spill on the rooftops

stay still, watch
shadows fle the bronze
majesty of bells

morning brightness
rises in the rhythm 
of the ocean, caressing

ancient mounds 
of cooled off lava 
at the edge of the dying world

inside the rib-cage 
of a cathedral
we learn to breathe

in the beached whale 
of a building
the city’s beating heart


(C) Maja Trochimczyk, October 19, 2013

Yes, I'm thankful for the cathedral. For the artisans who made its rosettes and stained glass windows,

I also thank the carpenters who built the walls of the Auberge des Deux Ponts near the Bibliotheque Polonaise on Ille de France, just around the corner from the Notre Dame. What a perfect, simple, elegant,  place. With ten tables for two, and a harmony of sights and tastes.

I count my blessings when I walk around in the rain. It is such a pleasure to take in the sights, the sounds. The wind and the wings of seagulls gathering above an old lady who came to feed the swans on the shore of the Seine. The whole aviary showed up, uninvited, and started their pithy battles for the crumbs.  I'm touched by the sight of the swans, and the one, oversized ugly duckling swimming nearby.


Yes, I'm grateful for the bread, the lady, and the swans. The violinist and artist Wanda Sobieska made hand-drawn illustrations for a new version of the Ugly Duckling, composed by Ken Woods and recorded by his ensemble. It took them two years to write a ten-minute tale. Was this time well spent?  Of course.

grey feathers fly

the gang pecks and screeches

poor ugly duckling 

But that turmoil was before the swan was aware who he really was: the majestic, glorious bird, of grace and beauty. A case of mistaken identity. Don't we all suffer from it sometimes? At all times? Do we know what are we here for? The contours of our lives outlined by heartbeats? The invisible links of affection? Shortcuts through time into the ever present, ever brilliant now? Are we thankful?

What are we thankful for?

Today, I'm grateful for music.  My travel to Paris is for a reunion of scholars, connected by an unlikely subject of a pianist-composer long gone, Maria Szymanowska died in 1831, why are we still talking about her? What is there in the life, in the music of this lovely, elegant lady, the Court Pianist to the Tsarina, that could possibly matter to us today?  Aren't we thankful for when we listen to Szymanowska's Romances sung by Elisabeth Zapolska and played by Bart van Oort on an antique Aloysius Graff fortepiano from 1820s? One of seven such instruments in the world... It has five pedals, can sound muted, distant, or jangling, percussive, or resonant and boisterous. Who knew so many colors could hide in a box of precious wood and metal? Hats off to those who made and restored this ancient beauty... Hats off to Elisabeth whose enthusiasm and warmth inspired so many...

Bart van Oort and Elizabeth Zapolska perform Maria Szymanowska. November 24, 2015.

Photo thanks to iFrance.fr.

Today, I'm grateful for libraries.  We would not know who we are, where we came from, who was here before us, what they thought, what they did, what they left for us to find, if not for the nameless armies of librarians, archivists, custodians of our past, and ushers of the future.  The Czartoryski family of aristocrats in Poland, and their Home Library of letters and notes that helps us understand the emotions felt by lonely mothers two hundred years ago.  The countless, nameless servants of truth, who made sure that these paper gifts survived until today (and are now in Krakow). The Great Emigration exiles in Paris that started the Bibliotheque Polonaise in 1830s, among them the son of Adam Mickiewicz, grandson of Maria Szymanowska, who kept Grandma's papers, jewels and even her satin slippers....

Maja Trochimczyk with Eva Davos-Talma and Prof. Irena Poniatowska, iFrancja.fr.

And let me thank the librarians: Ewa Rutkowska who guards the Mickiewicz manuscripts and Magdalena Glodek who oversees the rare prints and books. Thanks to them I could make my small discoveries, making order out of chaos. I identified a romance by a forgotten woman, Franciszka Kochanowska, found her death date and her family, and doubled the size of her known oeuvre, from one to two songs!!! Hurray!!! The first notice of this rare find was given at the 3e Maria Szymanowska Colloque held at the Polish Academy of Sciences in Paris, with Prof. Irena Poniatowska, my mentor, in attendance.

A page from Maria Szymanowska's Album, Manuscript No. 970, 

Bibliotheque Polonaise, Paris.

Soo, I'm grateful for books. The ones written and lovingly preserved, and the ones I'm going to write and publish.  One of my favorite books of all times is a set of illuminations of Dante's Divine Commedy by Giovanni di Paolo, way better than the 19th century dark imagery of weird angels and demons.  Giovanni paints huge golden suns, the dazzling brilliance of Primum Mobile with real gold.
A revelation and a delight.  Coupled with my favorite pomegranates from my tree: a treat for this Thanksgiving!

A Revelation After Il Paradiso

We live in the third sphere
of lovers, in the Earth’s long shadow
Our love waxes and wanes
like the Moon, or Venus rising up
before dawn, the star of the morning
We oscillate from darkness to brilliance,
float from fear into sunlight
to rest on a golden afternoon
in the innocent warmth of affection
among newly planted roses
Imperial, Electric, Compassion
Double Delight and Simplicity roses
in our garden where we trim dried, twisted
branches of old oleanders to make room
for orange blossoms and more pomegranate
always more pomegranate
never enough pomegranate

Dark red translucent juice stains our fingers
Tart juice bursts with flavor
in our mouths, ready for kisses
always ready for more kisses
softest, childlike, strongest, tasting
like the wine we never tasted, the dream
we never even hoped to dream about
escaping the long shadow
of the Earth on a golden afternoon
lovers in the Garden of Love
afternoon in the Third Sphere of Venus
golden, golden, sparkling golden
afternoon on another planet


(c) Maja Trochimczyk, October 2015

Finally,  and always, I'm thankful for those who love me, my children, my family, my friends.

Maja, Marcin, Agnieszka, Ian, Anna, May 3, 2015

Among them, there is the talented poet and visionary mystic of deep insights, Ambika Talwar who posted a beautiful note on Facebook... Yes, this is what FB is good for:

Thanksgiving Post from Ambika Talwar

Hello Everyone ~ I am here in ND remembering and counting my blessings, my lessons, the gifts from many of you through rough and gentle times. For this I am most grateful.

I am remembering my ability to serve and those willing to receive. For this I am most grateful.

I am remembering the diverse possibilities arising for our futures that so many of you have shared and I long to learn more ways by which our potential may be realised. For this I am most grateful.

I am remembering how utterly alone one can be in this vast world and how someone remembers or shows up to remind you we are not. For this I am grateful.

I am remembering my many homes while I sit here in my parents' living room making sense of all our ways and vagrancies, whose lessons are not always easy. For this I must be grateful for those above and those actions unmentioned. 

And mostly, I am remembering the life of my beloved father and his many sensitivities, sensibilities, and wisdoms - his delighting ways, his challenging ways, his capacities to know and to understand and to love despite our profound differences. To remember and to cherish all this is my deepest privilege now, knowing that this is what will carry me forth wherever I am to now step and claim as mine.

I am grateful for my kith and kin, my friends, my most delightful nieces and nephews, the birds and bees, horses.. all sentient beings, all life. I pray I find my new way and am fulfilled in ways not imagined before. And I wish this for each of you, for all of you.

With all my love ~ Ambika Talwar

Lois P. Jones, Maja Trochimczyk and Ambika Talwar, Photo by Susan Rogers.

Santa Monica's Rapp Saloon, October 2015

Isn't it a beautiful greeting? From the mind and the heart?

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. Today and always.

The New Year with a Sunbloom and a Mystic Rose

Camellia blossom, Descanso Gardens, December 2012

The Year 2013 will be very unusual. It is going to be the Year of the Snake, apparently filled with good luck, material blessings, but also with deception and interpersonal problems.  What it willl be depends on us, and we can make it a beautiful, blessed year, if we property focus our attention on things that matter.

Haiga "The Gift" (c) 2012 by Maja Trochimczyk

In response to an invitation by Susan Rogers, I created a little reminder of this focus on what really mattters as a bas-relief collage haiga, that is a paper and fabric image with a haiku-like comment.  The invitation was to create a poem or an art-work on the theme of the Snake or Target on a rectangular board.  The results in the form of calligraphy, artwork, photos will be displayed at the Japanese American Cultural Center in Los Angeles.  

My choice to make a surreal flower with petals from a white poinsetta, daisy, and a photo of matilla poppy, with a double eye in the middle reflected the choice of the theme - the Target. The eye is copied from another collage of mine, created for the Beatrix Project of Kathi Stafford for my poem "Rosa Mystica" and published in her chapbook (and reprinted below). 

Here, the double eye of the rose here becomes the eye of the Mystical Sunbloom. I entitled my little art-piece for the New Year 2013 - "The Gift" - and I think a lot of people, especially Christians and those following mystical traditions know the answer to this riddle. If not, reading the anthology Meditations on Divine Names is highly recommended. The answer to every question about the meaning of life and everything is "42" as we know from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.  The trouble is we do not know what is the question...

Ever calling - Never heard

Ever seeking - Never seen

Revealed

Detail from "The Gift" (c) 2012 by Maja Trochimczyk

Happy New Year 2013!

________________________________________________________________________

The original version of the eye appeared in a digital collage for "Rosa Mystica"  - a poem about Mother Mary and Dante's Paradiso.

Rosa Mystica

The love that calms this heaven always offers welcome

 with such greetings to make the candle ready for its flame 

 ~ Dante, Il Paradiso, Canto XXX: 52-54 

I knew it all along

(at least, suspected)

Beatrice’s swimming cap

betrays Heaven as nothing 

but an oversized pool

where saints swim like fish

in the river of light 

and God-Mother rests 

on white lounge petals 

of a Mystic Rose 

Giovanni di Paolo’s

illumined pages of Il Paradiso  

unveil creature comforts 

beyond the sapphire glow

of Dante’s Empyrean 

Angels curl in their pods

like babies asleep 

on metallic wings 

with round pillow halos 

of shimmering gold 

Multi-hued gowns of cobalt, 

salmon, palm green, and sienna 

reveal the childish joy 

 of heavenly hosts

adoring the Trinity 

Cherubs play hopscotch 

dance the Sarabande

twirl like a swarm of bees 

among light-bursts that do not 

 sear their eyes with pain 

Rushing waterfalls of laughter 

sparkle in diamond waves

of the robes of our Mother 

Daughter of her Son 

figlia del tuo figlio 

She gave Him a kiss 

on the way to Rose Garden 

serene Love’s Greeting

beneath seraphic wings 

rainbows that cut our darkness

 NOTES:

The digital art collage includes my photographs and Beatrix from Giovanni di Paolo’s illustrations for Il Paradiso. These images are a part of the British Library's Yates Thompson 36 Codex made in Sienna in the 15th century. Rosetti’s drawing of the Rose Garden is in the collection of the Museum of the Fine Arts in Boston and his painting of Love’s Greeting is in the Isabella Stewart Garner Museum in Boston.

The reference to the Virgin Mother, “figlia der tuo figlio” (daughter of your son), is from Dante, Il Paradiso, Canto XXXIII: 1.

 The ephigraph is cited from the Princeton Dante Project (http://etcweb.princeton.edu/dante/index.html): “Sempre l'amor che queta questo cielo / accoglie in sé con sì fatta salute / per far disposto a sua fiamma il candela.” Il Paradiso, Canto XXX: 52-54.

New Year, New Moon, New Light

Let us talk about the moon, then... In the month of February, the Village Poets of Sunland-Tujunga will present a wonderful, witty and erudite poet, Mari Werner (February 27, 2011, at 4:30 p.m., Bolton Hall Museum, 10110 Commerce Avenue, Tujunga, CA 91042). For her "portrait" on the series's blog, she sent in the following poem, which is so delightful, I decided to reproduce it here as well:

Crescent Moon

by Mari Werner

A crescent moon floats above the horizon.
“You can totally see the rest of it,”
she says, as though the moon is cheating.

And the moon is cheating.
A crescent moon should be
what a crescent moon looks like
in a bedtime story illustration,
a crescent clear and simple,
no dark sphere to detract
from its perfection.

Under the smile of the crescent moon,
she sleeps in fluffy comforters,
winked upon by stars
cuddled by a curled up cat,
guarded by a sleeping dog.

That’s the bedtime story version,
but here on the surface of the planet...
you can totally see the rest of it.

In Polish children's literature, the moon is often presented as a "crescent roll" - "rogalik" - brown, well baked and tasty, neither an alien, eerie source of lunar light, casting a pall on all living things (a la "Pierrot lunaire"), nor a wasteland of rocks and dust that the astronauts have walked on. Not really a place for lunatics, either... A tamed, story-book, crescent.

On New Year's Eve 2010, over a year ago, I saw the moon differently: full, enormous, with a fuzzy halo taking over half the sky. At midnight, it crowned the horizon with its lucid glory. I saw its bluish reflections in water droplets on my rose.
________________________________________

MIDNIGHT ROSE

"...quanta è la larghezza di questa rosa ne l’estreme foglie!" ~ Dante, Paradiso, Canto XXX

A pale light appeared behind the black ridge of the mountains. The moon floated up like a white balloon losing air, whitening the night around it. The bright halo cooled the glare of electric snowflakes on a Christmas fence, sheltering the reindeer of prickly light points and wire. The moon rose higher, the halo around it grew into a solid crown. It took over half the sky, sparkled in water droplets on the rose. Straight above our heads at midnight, it was a brilliant omen for the New Year.

the moon’s new halo
dims electric glare into calm -
illumination
________________________________________

As the night wore on, the intense whiteness of the moon at midnight reflected the brightness of my rose-shaped diamond brooch that could have been a heirloom, but was not. I make up my own history here, in the land of endless possibilities, so I have amassed a whole bunch of such "could have been" heirlooms. For instance, I bought my Canadian Grandma on E-bay - a portrait of her, at least. It is a gold-framed late 19th-century daguerrotype of a stern dark-haired lady with hands folded in her lap. Elegant, strong, and confident, with a lovely cameo brooch at her neck, small lace collar, and a wide skirt of a shiny brown tafetta dress - she looks like she could have been my ancestor. I'll adopt her, I thought, and clicked "buy now."

I did not buy the brooch, though, it came from my daughter's prom dress, worn once and discarded after one glorious night. I find its shiny petals a notable addition to my festive wardrobe. Like a magpie, I admire all things shiny; since I lost that platinum bracelet of real diamonds worth a couple thousand of dollars, a gift from my parents, I prefer to dazzle without the expense. I do not think any jewelrer would have loaned me those priceless gems for the Oscars. Here it is, a diamond rose sparkling in my haibun for the full moon.
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MIDNIGHT FIRE

"In the golden holiness of a night that will never be seen again and will never return…" ~ from a Gypsy tale

After greeting the New Year with a Chopin polonaise danced around the hall, I drove down the street of your childhood. It was drenched with the glare of the full moon in a magnificent sparkling halo. The old house was not empty and dark. On the front lawn, boys were jumping around a huge bonfire. They screamed with joy, as the flames shot up to the sky. The gold reached out to the icy blue light, when they called me to join their wild party. Sparks scattered among the stars. You were there, hidden in shadows. I sensed your sudden delight.

my rose diamond brooch
sparkles on the black velvet -
stars at midnight
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