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My most memorable Mother's Day... a tenacious memory that tugs at my heart and
may touch yours. |
by Dr. Jeffrey Lant
Author's program note. My mother is dead now. But I want you to know
that hardly a day goes by when I don't think of her... not in some
idealized fashion either. For she was a vibrant, beautiful creature
whose reality, for me, even if flawed, was more compelling than any
fairy tale I might make up. And as for charm, why she was a by-word for
that; I knew that before I even knew what charm could lead to. Some say
that along with her penetrating eyes I inherited my full measure of that
charm too. I leave that to you to find out.
This article is being written because it gives me the perfect
opportunity to remember her... not just vaguely... but as she was and
remains in my mind's eye, a real woman, my much loved and often argued
with mother. Here I am able to indulge myself in the most profound
memories, certain that I am writing this article for you... not just for
myself. And because the woman is important and the day I am recalling
here one of the handful of truly special days of her life (so she often
told me afterwards), I savor every word as I think it, write it,
consider it, review it -- and if not perfect and exactly so, change it.
For there is not a word here or even a comma that I can accept in any
other way. For you see, this was one of the handful of truly special
days of my life... and I want you to share it and know why.
Thomas Gray, treasured poet.
Where did my mother's love affair with England and her poets begin? I
cannot say, but I can recall that wherever we lived its premises were
littered with the lyric beauty of the English language... where words
mattered, where understanding them mattered, where using them to maximum
effect mattered, and where a word was never an obstacle but a friend
not yet known well enough, but welcome for all that. As such, books,
rarely closed, always open with makeshift book marks were found in every
room. We read as effortlessly as we breathed... and the splendor of
language surrounded us, shaped us, sustained us... and no one more than
my mother for whom poets were accounted special beings well deserving of
the veneration they received from her... and in due course from me. And
so the profound love between a mother and her first-born son was made
manifest in the poems we discovered and shared, the readings of such
poems to each other, and the meanings we strove to find... especially
for me when she was gone before. Then these bonds mattered most of all.
Thomas Gray, 26 December 1716 - 30 July 1771, just 54 years old.
Thomas Gray was born in Cornhill, London, the son of an exchange broker
and a milliner. He was the fifth of 12 children... 11 of whom died in
infancy. he smell of death permeated his young world... a constant
visitor to his home, a constant reality where birth and mourning seemed
inextricably linked and inevitable. And so he grew up wondering whether
his own expected demise was nigh, accelerated by his abusive father.
This recurring thought shaped his life, his outlook, and his poems.
Later in life Gray became known as one of the "Graveyard poets" of the
late 18th century, along with Oliver Goldsmith, William Cowper, and
Christopher Smart. But for Gray this was not a pose; he had been to the
graveyard too often too early for that. Death and Gray were on intimate
terms from the start.
His sense of humor.
For all that Gray's life was turbulent and difficult, it had moments of
unalloyed joy, not least because he had the valued knack of seeing the
humorous side of even the most oppressive subjects. It is good to see he
skewered the masters of Peterhouse at Cambridge University as "mad with
Pride" and the Fellows of this College as "sleepy, drunken, dull,
illiterate Things." It was the kind of thing I wrote to my college
friends, too, and I knew the joy of such characterizations.
My mother knew I wrote these kinds of acid word pictures; I sent them to
her, and she carefully tied them with ribbons adding her own often
equally acid responses. These, too, bonded us; we laughed together. Too,
there were other traits which may have made her see me in Gray: he
spent his time indoors, voracious reader, avoiding athletics and
exercise of any kind. But when the companionship of his friends was
offered, he was a crowd pleaser with the apt, devastating mot at the
ready. Gray and I might have been siblings; surely Kindred Spirits...
she must have seen this... and if so have approved.
"Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard".
Thus, my mother traveled to England where I was then working on my first
book and asked me to accompany her to the setting of one of her
favorite poems, the "Elegy" written slowly, painstakingly between 1742
and 1750. She had waited a lifetime for this excursion... and so she and
I on Mother's Day went hand-in-hand to the ancient village of Stoke
Poges, to the churchyard of the Church of England parish church of St.
Giles. There great Gray's remains repose for the numberless ages, his
monument weathered, tilted, too much too illegible, special torment for
this man of perfect wording.
We had come hence to see, to learn, to venerate.... and in the graveyard
to read the "Elegy", together, in turn, lyrically, each word a pledge
to love each other now and forever, though I didn't know its purpose
then.
She had her tattered, well thumbed Gray in hand, so did I.
So we commenced the reading, the first stanza hers by right to intone:
"The curfew tolls the knell of parting day/ The lowing herd wind slowly
o'er the lea/ The ploughman homeward plods his weary way/ And leaves the
world to darkness and to me."
We are borne on these words to the place we most want to be with the
person in this sublime moment we both wish most to be with.
Thus we walked and read together from the celebrated words which British
General James Wolfe read to his officers September 12, 1759 the day
before he was killed in battle, saying "Gentlemen, I would rather have
written that poem than take Quebec tomorrow." It was an admission made
by thousands of those who have thrilled to these sonorous words and
their eternal relevance to struggling mankind.
'Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife"
Now my mother has gone the way of all flesh, the way we all must trod in
time. We know such an end is natural but that does not assuage the
bitter grief and finality of the matter, particularly when the dear
departed is one's mother. This loss is bitter indeed at whatever age it
occurs.
Thomas Gray knew all this and in his beloved "Elegy", popular from the
moment of publication, popular still, he gave us all the words we need
to cope, find hope and resignation -- and the words of remembrance and
above all of love.
Thus whenever I miss her and want her near me in all her humanity and
that dazzling smile I can never forget, I take down from the clutter of
my library her copy of Gray's "Elegy" and read it aloud, as we did that
memorable Mother's Day so very long ago. Whenever possible I go to any
search engine and play Domenico Scarlatti's Sonata in D minor (published
1738). It was one of Gray's favorites and perfect accompaniment to his
surgically precise words.
"The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power/ And all that beauty, all that
wealth e'er gave/ Awaits alike the inevitable hour/ The paths of glory
lead but to the grave."
But not, with God's help and with Thomas Gray's, to the dark void of
forgetfulness and oblivion. They have given us the joys of memory and
the words we need to summon it --and our loved ones -- at will and thus
they live again in us.
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About the Author
Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing
a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses.
Services include home business training, affiliate marketing training,
earn-at-home programs, traffic tools, advertising, webcasting, hosting,
design, WordPress Blogs and more. Find out why Worldprofit is considered
the # 1 online Home Business Training program by getting a free
Associate Membership today.
Republished with author's permission.http://HomeBizCentury.com. |
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