*
When you appear
all the rivers sound
in my body, bells
shake the sky,
and a hymn fills the world.
-Pablo Neruda
*
Fourteen years of marriage my beloved. Sixteen years since we first met. My love spreads wider each day. Marriage is much harder work than I ever expected, and far more rewarding than I ever could have anticipated. Our marriage has been a crucible of healing and transformation. We have had many struggles, but you are my closest friend, my lover, the one who supports me in all of my longings, who knows my most unflattering secrets, who makes me laugh with joyful abandon, who holds me in my sorrow, and the one who makes me feel absolutely, undeniably cherished. As I try to express to you the depth of how I feel, I turn again to the master of the poetry of love, Pablo Neruda.
When I die, I want your hands on my eyes:
I want the light and wheat of your beloved hands
to pass their freshness over me once more:
I want to feel the softness that changed my destiny.
I want you to live while I wait for you, asleep.
I want your ears still to hear the wind, I want you
to sniff the sea’s aroma that we loved together,
to continue to walk on the sand we walk on.
I want what I love to continue to live,
and you whom I love and sang above everything else
to continue to flourish, full-flowered:
so that you can reach everything my love directs you to,
so that my shadow can travel along in your hair,
so that everything can learn the reason for my song.
-Pablo Neruda
You are my treasure.
-Christine
13 Responses
Happy, happy anniversary to the two of you. There is nothing quite like a good marriage to offset some of the other things we deal with in life. I am so happy the two of you found each other! I met Beloved briefly and saw how loving and gentle he was with you, as was lovely Tune. What a nice family!
We celebrated our 35th on the 18th. I feel blessed.
happy anniversary! you both are very fortunate to have found such a love!
Happy Anniversary! Christine & Beloved!
Love Pablo Neruda too!
happy anniversary, christine! and how lovely to have entered into the sweetness of such a covenant relationship during harvest time. i am smiling because when my beloved and i married, the bookmarks of that day and everything in between were the words of Pablo Neruda. poem after glorious poem echoed in our hearts and the hearts of our guests. they echo still almost 20 years later. in remembrance of the two of you i lift my glass and speak these words. may they travel over the miles to find a home in you ….
“The minute I heard my first love story,
I started looking for you, not knowing
how blind that was.
Lovers don’t finally meet somewhere,
they’re in each other all along.”
– Rumi
Translator: Coleman Barks
“As spring unfolds the dream of the earth,
May you bring each other’s hearts to birth.
As the ocean finds calm in view of land,
May you love the gaze of each other’s mind.
As the wind arises free and wild,
May nothing negative control your lives.
As kindly as moonlight might search the dark,
So gentle may you be when light grows scarce.
As surprised as the silence that music opens,
May your words for each other be touched with
reverence.
As warmly as the air draws in the light,
May you welcome each other’s every gift.
As elegant as dream absorbing the night,
May sleep find you clear of anger and hurt.
As twilight harvests all the day’s color,
May love bring you home to each other.
– John O’Donohue
Happy Anniversary from ‘on the road’ as I travel with my beloved – we are faniliar with your description of marriage and add our ‘ditto’!! Blesssings to you andyours.
Happy Anniversary, and may you have many more, with God’s blessing. How wonderful, that you have both been blessed with such a precious, rare and wonderous gift. And how wonderful that you both are willing to WORK at the unfolding of that gift, with an open, generous and couageous love. May you be an example to others, of the possibilities of genuine love.
Thank you friends! Yes Bette, my husband does indeed have character. ;-)
So beautiful Christine. Thank you for sharing this love with us and the wonderful words of Neruda. Say hello to your beloved for me, and
Happy Anniversary!
Happy Anniversary! You are both very fortunate to have each other. Lovely choices of poetry. And I can tell by your husband’s wonderful hat that he has great character!
Happy Anniversary, Christine and your Beloved! I wish you many more years of glorious unfolding.