A wintry affair

I've mentioned before (long ago, over on Froogville) that one of the first things my Great Lost Love, The Poet, ever said to me was that she had a line that was nagging at her and she was trying to work something up around it: "Who am I to say what gleams?"

I was powerfully struck by it too, though not so much, perhaps, for the line itself, or the allusions it was pregnant with, but for the unexpected suggestion of self-deprecation in it. It wasn't something I could ever conceive of saying 'in my own voice', because it's so out of tune with my robust self-image. However, it did set my mind running, and I knocked off a few little pieces of my own around the idea of 'gleaming' in the following days (one of the best I already included in that early post I just mentioned).

The first, though, and perhaps in some ways the best (the most raw, the most immediate, the most heartfelt), was in my head when I woke up (after a night of troubled sleep) the morning after my first proper date with her. I met her late in October, pursued her with varied success throughout the following month, and then finally consummated the affair for two mad, glorious weeks at the beginning of December..... and then spent the next 3 or 4 months getting over it. It was a chilly autumn that year, and an early, brutal onset of winter. I remember a lot of drab, foggy days; and a lot of bright but fiercely cold ones.

Beijing can be a particularly bleak city, especially in that kind of weather. And such was the inspiration behind this - it is as much a Beijing poem (one of my only ones, oddly enough) as it is a poem about her. Context is all, I suppose: I couldn't help but view her as part of Beijing.

I think that I sensed a sadness in her when she spoke this line, a fragility of self-image - and that produced a powerful, overwhelming urge in me to try to reassure her, to make her feel appreciated, to help her feel stronger about who she was. It was amazing to me that she could pose such a self-doubting question. Surely, I wanted to tell her, you must realise that you are the gleamingest thing in this whole damn city?!

It only recently occurred to me that I am now navigating the anniversary for the second time. It still resonates powerfully in my soul. I suspect this is the reason why I have been so cranky and depressed over the last couple of weeks, despite the blue skies and comparatively mild weather, quite different from what it was in most of those crazy weeks I was with her - or after her, anyway. (I remember it snowed on about the 2nd or 3rd of December that year, and she commented - rather unexpectedly, somewhat out of character! - on how romantic it was to be walking home hand-in-hand with me through the snow. That was about the high point of the whole relationship. The snow didn't last long, and soon turned to slush..... Yes, that's another metaphor taking me over, there. Stop it!)

Anyway, the poem:


Know that you gleam

Amid the dross of this our daily life
In the blank hugeness of the city
Among the expat flotsam & jetsam
You gleam

Down a million grubby alleys
In a thousand smoky bars
Amongst the half-arsed conversations
You gleam

In the drear of autumn,
In dusty parks, on gridlocked streets
Among the billion soulless souls
You gleam

Amid the dullness everywhere
Dull brains, dull minds, dull hearts
Against the greyness everywhere
In a grey city, grey world
The one bright thing