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Friday, May 9, 2014

Farewell--at last, mid-May, THE POEM: "Crazy, About Love"

The last Napowimo 2014 prompt its to write a farewell.  The ideas that spring to mind are ones I want to write about as anecdotes or essays, and I don't want to pre-empt those thoughts before their time.  So my mind wanders over farwell songs I know, and I decide to have some fun, weaving a good night or farewell song with familiar phrasess and lines from well known, popular farewell/good night songs. Let me start with:
Good Night Sweetheart
Irene, Good Night
Abraham, Martin, and John
I'm Leavin', on a Jet Plane
I'll be seeing you
Sleep, my child, and Peace Attend Thee
So long, fare well, auf wiedersehn, good night,
Sentimental Journey
Me and my shadow
                                 -- and see where they get me...
                                 Weeks later: This proves to be the hardest task yet,
                                 but in a way the most satisfying...selecting workable
                                 lines of songs I've loved, and weaving them into something
                                 personal and new.                    
No, that was not the poem.  Now, on May 23, the poem forms, based on words/lines from those songs:

Crazy, About Love

Good night, sweetheart.
I, my midnight watch still keeping,
vigil chasing dreams of sleep,
never felt such sorrows deep.
Good sorrow, sweet sorrow,
sweet good, night sorrow,
beside me/you.  Tomorrow,
sweet sorrow, sweetheart..

I live in dreams--
dreams will enfold you'
enfold me in your dreams
sweet sorrow apart..
Just look around, try to find some good.
Beside me/you
tomorrow, sweet dreams.
Oh, night sorrow burns bright
there by your fireside light.
Every song I sing is just for you.

So kiss me one more time
in all the old familiar places.
Look at everything bright
Tonight I'll be looking at the moon,
Tomorrow will come as soon
as we fly away tonight.
                    --Shirley Smith Franklin

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