I had a few hours to kill before Molly's Bat Mitzvah tonight so I headed to the hills. I went from Denver up to Boulder to go hiking. Mom told me exactly where to go.
Mom used to live in Boulder after college. She worked on a bike race called the "Coors Classic." I know she loves it here.
I went on a hike up to a peak called, Royal Arch. I figured it would be good training for the trip to England, since they're a monarchy. That means they have a king or queen.
When I got to the top, I pulled out a poem I've been carrying around with me a while waiting for the right place/moment to read it. It is called Threnody and it was written by Ralph Waldo Emerson about how sad he was when his first son, Waldo, died of scarlet fever. This happened way back in 1842, and I found the writing very hard to understand. But there were parts I "got" and could relate to.
You're my darling, wondrous, hyacinthine, gracious boy.
Here is just a short part of the poem from the beginning. I thought the mention of "looking over the hills," was cool considering I was reading it up 7,000 feet high.
Threnody
The south-wind brings
Life, sunshine, and desire,
And on every mount and meadow
Breathes aromatic fire,
But over the dead he has no power,
The lost, the lost he cannot restore,
And, looking over the hills, I mourn
The darling who shall not return.
I see my empty house,
I see my trees repair their boughs,
And he, —the wondrous child,
Whose silver warble wild
Outvalued every pulsing sound
Within the air's cerulean round,
The hyacinthine boy, for whom
Morn well might break, and April bloom,
The gracious boy, who did adorn
The world whereinto he was born,
And by his countenance repay
The favor of the loving Day,
Has disappeared from the Day's eye;
Far and wide she cannot find him,
My hopes pursue, they cannot bind him.
Returned this day the south-wind searches
And finds young pines and budding birches,
But finds not the budding man;
Nature who lost him, cannot remake him;
Fate let him fall, Fate can't retake him;
Nature, Fate, men, him seek in vain.
Life, sunshine, and desire,
And on every mount and meadow
Breathes aromatic fire,
But over the dead he has no power,
The lost, the lost he cannot restore,
And, looking over the hills, I mourn
The darling who shall not return.
I see my empty house,
I see my trees repair their boughs,
And he, —the wondrous child,
Whose silver warble wild
Outvalued every pulsing sound
Within the air's cerulean round,
The hyacinthine boy, for whom
Morn well might break, and April bloom,
The gracious boy, who did adorn
The world whereinto he was born,
And by his countenance repay
The favor of the loving Day,
Has disappeared from the Day's eye;
Far and wide she cannot find him,
My hopes pursue, they cannot bind him.
Returned this day the south-wind searches
And finds young pines and budding birches,
But finds not the budding man;
Nature who lost him, cannot remake him;
Fate let him fall, Fate can't retake him;
Nature, Fate, men, him seek in vain.
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