The Evolution of a Love Story: 1975–1976, Volume 3

By Mark Okey Decker

Volume 3, containing poems from 1975 and 1976, is the third in a series of poetry books Mark Decker is publishing about the evolution of the love story that he and Molly share.
The years the poems in Volume 3 were written, 1975-1976, were very interesting, exciting years for Molly and me. We had our first child, Mark, Jr; and, I got into law school. President Fords staff asked me to be a law clerk in the Office of Counsel to the President while attending law school. So, in addition to continuing to manage the White House Health Unit, in Room 11 of the Old Executive Office Building, I had an office in the law library in Room 106 for my law clerking duties.
We loved our little family and enjoyed living off Quaker Lane on Martha Custis Drive in Parkfairfax, Alexandria, Virginia. That little one bedroom, garden apartment was an awesome place to start off our life together. We loved it. Molly was working for Texas Democratic Senator Lloyd Bentsen on his 1976 Presidential campaign staff. Senator Bentsen was running to get the Democratic nomination against Jimmy Carter. I was working for Republican President Ford. Those were congenial, collegial days in political Washington. Democrats and Republicans not only talked to each other but also worked with each other to get legislation passed.
I started my legal education at the International School of Law founded by Dean Braebner-Smith, a genius and dedicated to legus lex and the pursuit of all things related to natural law. The law school has become internationally recognized and is now called George Mason University Antonin Scalia Law School. Volume 3 takes us just up to December, 1976, just after the 1976 election. Jimmy Carter beat Lloyd Bentsen for the Democratic nomination; and surprise to me, also beat President Gerald R. Ford.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Aug 19, 2016
• ISBN: 9781524612306

Mark Okey Decker

The author continues to write. He and Molly live in Great Falls, Virginia. They have three children and seven grandchildren.

Book preview

The Evolution of a Love Story:

1975–1976, Volume 3

MARK OKEY DECKER

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© 2016 Mark Decker. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 08/18/2016

ISBN: 978-1-5246-1231-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5246-1229-0 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-5246-1230-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016909017

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Contents

More to Give

New Playground

No Time for Rest

Miles Burris Decker—Died

Let Nature Speak a Word

Eulogy For My Father

Becoming Man

Our Ends Have Met january,

Goodliness Not Mine

You Are What you are

Freedom Is

Heart Full of Glee

A Woman’s Influence on Man

My Heart Aflame

When Past is Gone

Searching for the Divine

A Clown Without a Circus

An Adventurer’s Home

Life is As it Should Be

New Stages

Follow Faith

Washington, DC

Beckon the Bounding Life

She and l

We Touched in Heaven

Molly

Master of Time

Infinite is Justice

Carry On, Siddhartha

What to Do With Myself

When the People are Ignored

Dad

The Circle With Fixed Spokes

The Endless Teacher

The Songs of Life

Law Students

She Makes the Garden Grow

Words

Attempt to Redefine

Eternal Vigilance

We Have Not Forgotten

More About You, Me and Us

I Can Only Think of You

Hope

Yearning

The Sweet and Sour Orange

The Seed

Let Us Rejoice

Boy Becoming Man

Lucky Man Am I

Blessed With Child Yet Born

Children’s Limitations

Breathe

Where the Soldier Fought

Do As You Please

Enormous Hill

Lady

Me and My Buddy

Rejuvenate

The Wisdom of a She

Crossroads

A Wish is To a Thought

Nurturing the Seeds

At Times We See

The Strength to Take Next Steps

My Companion, the Wizard

The Healing Power of Time

Caught in the Vacuum

Uplifting Heart

You Lift Me Up

Is Man Disappearing

Imagine

In Blue Speckled Thought

Man Too Late Forgives Himself

I’ll Be With Her

If I Would, You Would, You Said

Uncertainty of Existence

Parents

The Stranger in Me

My Mind Swirls in Patterns

Freedom from Self

Fragile Passion

Life Is What You Make It

The One

Liberated Man

The Fortune That I Seek

Human Savoir

We Learn To Overcome

The Fall of Life

Knowledge

Sarcasm Saved By Love

Lady Liberty

A Man Without a Name

Faith’s Obscurity

A Lady’s Gift

Questions We Can Answer

Inexplicable Goodness

Our Baby is Coming

Tears ofJoy

Old School Love-page 1

Old School Love-page 2

You Have the Answer

Being Alonef

Turn Towards Heaven

Dream Away

Home From the Hospital

I See This Child in Me

Letter to My Son

Letter to My Mother

Home, It’s in My Heart

I’ll Build You a Castle

The Trails of Snails

Dead Sparrow Sing

The Never Ending Search

The Mind

Serenity

Life’s Short Lessons

Christmas

Christmas Moment

To Fatherless Children

Feelings

Boys Don’t Lie

The Poet’s Dilemma

Time and Truth

The Hesitant Lover

The Military Man

A Mystery of Life

Love Songs Never End

Feeling Content

The Longest Season

I Would

The Human Zoo

Molly & Mark & Marriage (p. 1)

Molly & Mark & Marriage (p. 2)

A Breath ofLife

Father O’Brien’s Fable

A Country Boy Died in the City

The Wanderer

Evolution

Razz-Ma-Tazz

Men Rise and Fall

An Expectation of Advancement

What’s the World Coming To

The Long Awaited Summer

For He Who Longs to Be a Star

Lost Love

The Poetry Man

In Days of Old

You Are Away From Me

Ego’s Flight

A Beautiful Day

Fools

To Those Who Know

American Ballad

Will I Ever Be

Companion

I Don’t See Nothin’ New

Past and Future

They Defined Humanity

Family Album

Emotional Balance

Breaking Out

Attitude

Dreams Come True

Watching a Storm

Burdens

Home

What I Have

A Mind’s Song

Gone the Illusions

The Stranger

Again, One Day

Preacher!

Like Yourself

Ode to John Donne

Les P. Harris—Hey Les

Camp David

In Nixon’s Camp David

Spare Me

Is Life Ever Fair

Are You Happy

Getting Away From it All

Law School Exams

Being Alone

Wheels of Time

The Grand Old Tree

Friction

Love’s Happy Song

Rainbow

The Power of Words

Time of Upheaval

Struggling to Know Us

In America

You Own Your Heart

The Occasional Lover

Listen to the Elders

Sons of America

The Weaver

Our Founding Fathers

Where are the Women

The Lake (page l of 3)

The Lake (page 2 of 3)

The Lake (page 3 of 3)

Falling Short

Death

Playing the Game

I AmMan

Accountability

Great Men

Life Will Take its Course

The Path is Clear

From the Pen of ldiots

I Cannot Go Back

The i in Me

Man’s Dual Eye

On Growing Old By Ourselves

The State of Medicine

The Song of Summer

The Circle of Life

My Son

I Will Find a Way

Words

A Citizen’s Lament

Small Face in a Large Crowd

Here Comes Our World

My Country

Children

A Congressman’s Soliloquy (a satire)

Song To My Family

On Happiness

Watching Time

Happy the Days We Are Together

Exquisite You

There is No End

The Winning American Attitude

There You’ll Find a Home

Now, I Know

The Pardon of Nixon

Folly

Give Some Love

My Secret Weapon

Loving Me is Not Easy

The Storm

Each Man Needs an Island

Dreaming

As I Look Back

When Iwas a Man

An August Day

Mondays

Busy Days With No Slumber

A Poet’s World Returned

Eight Great Poets

A Friend To Man

Pure Poetry

Bedtime

A Writer’s Eye

My Woman

Luck

I Miss

The Carnival Man

Older Americans

Welcome (to Law School)

Your Brain is a Muscle

The Smoker

It’s All There

The Writer

A Tadpole

The Gap Is Bridged

Candle

Suburbanites

Modern Shakespeare

A Lovely Lady—My Mom & Mrs. Freeman

Good-bye Our Washington

A Toast

My Star·Everybody’s Star

Experience, Knowledge and Desire

A Brighter Side

An Unaccomplished Man

My Head and My Heart

There Are Times When … . .

Music

A Peaceful Spot (at night)

To Kay at Twenty and Six

District Clerk

The Vacation

On Seeing You

Solitude

Good Night and Good Day

Ode to Yevgeny Yevtushenko

Choosing Our Next President

Diary

The Juggler

The Carnival Man, II

Everyman

Nowhere Am I Happier

You Are On Your Own

Suddenly Very Uncertain

Dylan Keep On Fiddling

Changing

Those Questions Again

Rhyming Out

The Aftermath

Monday

My Kind

Grade School Nostalgia

Oldies but Goodies

Lafayette Park When it Rains

Knock, Knock

Truth or Glory

A Child’s Song

Time Tells Us

The Riderless Horse

Reappearing Legacy

Law School—Mid Quarter

Man’s Frailty

A Poet’s Dream to be Published

The Constant Charade

The Pain of Life

Mr.K

The Wise Man’s Club

Law School Mondays

God Help Our Country

England

For You, Molly

Mind’s Fancy Flight

Hard & Desperate Times

Our Yellow Brick Road

Happiness Begets Happiness

Taurus Visits Mount Hope

Thank You (Molly)

I can Do

Note For the Record

Does America Deserve Jimmy Carter

A Moment in History, The Election of

Election ’76—Ford Concedes

The Country Can’t Be Your Family

Dear Mark, Jr., at Age One

Sell Dad’s House! Never

The Young Lawyer

The Moon and The Night

Autobiography

Soliloquy of a Married Law Student (prose)

Soliloquy of a Married Law Student (cont, page 2)

Waiting & Hoping & Searching

Clinging to Immortality

Greatness

A Winner

Post Election—Pre-Carter

My Woman, My Lass

Strolling with My Lady

You Sweet, Fair & Beautiful

Back From my Self Journey

Why I Love You

Most Everything Is You

Where Is The Poet?

So Far, So Good

A New Beginning

The Philosopher’s Gift

Reach For the Brass

The Bright Kids Waiting In the Wings

Missing A Law School Final Cause I Didn’t Have My Number

More to Give        1975

As the mellow light of evening falls;

A sigh that forms upon my face allows me to rest, and

Peacefully replay the thought of you;

In my mind’s dry desert

You are an oasis brought to quench.

I thrill at the thought of us together;

Sweetness, may I call you?

Sweetness you surely are;

Your music is sweet;

Your heart is sweeter;

Like daisies in a field you are fresh and alive.

I love you, and cannot hold it back;

You fill my heart with joy;

I’ve fallen entirely into your wondrous love.

Life, through sweetest you;

Love, my memory always

As day-to-day we touch.

You have given me your all;

What is greater still,

We both have more to give;

You are our home carved from heaven;

Placed upon this earth;

And, you have shown me happiness;

And, you have shown me love;

And, I will make your offering my acceptance.

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New Playground        1975

Like the wind that rustles leaves about,

My thought arouses to the sunshine of childhood;

To its sunset and rebirth in elder youth

With it slow ascent toward becoming an adult.

Trees we used to play in,

Climbing like monkeys, laughing as we tumble;

As we trip and as we stumble;

We are children, forever wondering.

Who wants to grow up;

A grown-up wants his childhood returned

Where we are still restless and carefree;

Where we still admire our friends;

Where we fear no unknown;

Where we grasp the nature of nature;

Where we still walk putting one foot forward,

Teasing bullies and learning from mistakes;

We are too young to give our notions definition;

We need, always, to be young and free.

New life begins where one departs the other;

As if what always was will always be;

We could not ask for more;

As we have reached our pinnacle

Let us depart together on our trek;

Making friends with the world,

Our new playground.

No Time for Rest        1-9/12-1975

Dear father with grand soul;

I watched you ride your fate;

Your suffering was weaker

Than the strength of your courage;

Your heart beat quickly, and

You rode to destiny;

Yours shall never die.

At twenty-six I’m so much younger

Than I was at twenty-five;

There is nothing quite like faith

That tomorrow will be brighter;

I have my freedom;

I fight for it like our cave-dwelling ancestors;

Like my Father, the Marine,

Who peered into the darkness

Of a lonely cave, into the empty sky

And wondered . . . .

Where it all began and where it all will end;

Why must it end.

I will save in my heart what’s worth keeping;

My soul becomes a home;

Between here and eternity is no time for sleeping;

There is not time for rest till living here has gone.

Miles Burris Decker—Died Today        1-3-1975

Dear God;

When wrath you brought

Upon this son of yours;

While sleeping eased his pain;

As beauty slowly slipped away

He saw you, and

There was hope, again.

He was a dreamer

Who couldn’t live forever;

Who fought, a Marine, until the end;

This man;

A sacrifice in glory

Will be his grandchild’s story;

Of a mountain;

Of a man;

They were the same;

Strong and glorious;

High and gallant; and aloof;

But most of all

So desperately alone.

And, through a home

He was provided,

He had a home on earth.

Let Nature Speak a Word        1975

You’ll hear from a