You, My Love: (A Diary in Verse)

By Richard Atwood

13 January

You are into me
like flame and fire
as no other desire could
know such gentle fury

...like an undefined thirst
incalculably uncontrolled,
or passion spent in seeking
a wild
and wondrous rose.

With love, as in life, there are no guarantees. Except always a beginning, always an end. Nothing else is certain, set in some. The thoughts and emotions that drive us indeed ever churning, changing... ever in flux, ebb and flow.

So, too, the heart- yet once fixed, as relentless as a star: the blaze too brilliant to be near, consuming all. Whether right or wrong, a force of such power and import, almost impossible to stop. Impossible not to desire above all things (whether prudent or unwise)... moving us to destiny or despair.

May your star remain fixed - your love, the life it was meant to be.

You, My Love... a diary in verse was a winning Finalist in the poetry category of the 2010 National Indie Excellence Awards. It was also the poetry Runner-up in the 2011 London Book Festival, and the Runner-up in the 2012 Paris Book Festival.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Feb 12, 2008
• ISBN: 9781462059362

Richard Atwood

Born in Baltimore; raised in York County, Pennsylvania, served in the USAF, with tours in Greece, Turkey, and Germany. Rick has lived in Los Angeles and Denver; currently in Wichita, Kansas. He has also authored two other books of poetry, three screenplays, and two epic stage plays, plus several songs.

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Copyright © 2008, 2012 by Richard Atwood.

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ISBN: 978-0-5954-6510-1 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4620-5936-2 (ebk)

iUniverse rev. date: 03/12/2012

Miki…

frontispiece.tif

7 July 1966

Sembach, Germany

I give you these words

and a chance for stars on a starless night,

when loneliness in each of us

will come to bring the void too deep,

too far away to bear…

(though this we’ll have)

to keep us safe

through every ringing day without,

made hollow by the notes of

aching in our bones…

to keep us warm

as cloaks, these shells

we’ll wear as useful things

that will so little feel

       save pain

                       of wonderment,

       re-swearing to our battered troth

       upon the seas

                               … the stormy, stormy seas

       to come to crush and freeze.

These words…

       to keep us safe,

       to keep us on

       the charted page

       we’ve booked… for

       passage through the time

       we’ll never know.

CONTENTS

I give you these words

BOOK ONE

Part I

Like children

I had never loved before

By the light of day

One thousand and some nine

You, would I take to Delphi…

My need is wild and insane.

Night brings on my storm

Once, so long ago,

Fear and doubt

I wish a thousand wishes,

More beautiful than the sea are you,

Would I… could I…

I cannot stand to see other men possess you

I want to see your face by moonlight,

I saw you by moonlight

Is this how it should be

I have taken you in love

How I would love to spend with you

Part II

By the light of candles unseen

It seems

I cannot stand to look at you

Sometimes

Tonight, I say I do not know her…

an affair

From night till dawn I’ll call you

I weep of when

Your eyes

Her:

without you… no words

And I remember how there were days and nights

Part III

Am I not erotic enough

Wondrously fair

You are my strength and my weakness,

Never anything

In

Reviews for You, My Love

[iwatson_39 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Fortunately for me I found the "notes" at the end of the book before I started reading the pieces in "You, My Love." The notes gave me an understanding that this is "A diary, exactly as it happened. Without intention...an older, married woman, a younger man. A diary first - a book of poems, second."As I am attempting to write this review I keep contemplating on what I've read; where it started and where it ended...and all the emotional roller coasters in between. Richard Atwood draws in the reader's heart and emotional aspects of the self with each piece of writing. The wordsmithing is incredible and I admire how he is able to portray the feelings in so few words.I encourage poetry lovers to read this book, not only for the poetry itself but to appreciate how Atwood is able to create a whole journey of love, pain, dismay, separation, wonderment and consolation in diary format. I just wish I had more words to say to really give this book the justice it deserves.

[lb12_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This diary is of a modern day Paolo and Francesca who instead of being eternally damned in Dante’s Inferno are damned by living. The heaviness of this work is explosive, not even the slightest sigh is light. Atwood grants the reader an insight into the kaleidoscope of emotion he felt that comes with the most intense of loves. Richard Atwood strips all pretenses of love and prostrates himself onto the page in such raw fashion that the reader is forever affected. For some reason he is granted a moments glimpse into the heavenly realms and falls in love with a goddess eternally scarring his soul. Such intense passion collided with pain so much so that the equilibrium of nature suffered. Whether this is a love story or a cursed tragedy or both is up for the reader to decide. “Even the wind screams of such injustice.”There is no comparing this to other masterpieces, this stands alone.