“you’re the sunflower / i think your love would be too much / or you’ll be left in the dust”

[larryhammer]

For Poetry Monday:

From a Car Window, Ruth Guthrie Harding

Pines, and a blur of lithe young grasses;
    Gold in a pool, from the western glow;
Spread of wings where the last thrush passes—
    And thoughts of you as the sun dips low.

Quiet lane, and an irised meadow …
    (How many summers have died since then?)…
I wish you knew how the deepening shadow
    Lies on the blue and green again!

Dusk, and the curve of field and hollow
    Etched in gray when a star appears:
Sunset, … twilight, … and dark to follow, …
    And thoughts of you through a mist of tears.


Harding (1882-1971) apparently published a single collection, the 1916 A Lark Went Singing, from which this came. I’ve hardly any other bio-data for her, aside from the tidbit that after being widowed in 1926 after 25 years of marriage, she remarried in 1931 to the poet and critic Richard Burton (not Sir Richard the explorer, but an American), the dedicatee of her collection and who had supplied a laudatory introduction.

---L.

Subject quote from Sunflower, Post Malone & Swae Lee.

Comments

[puddleshark]

That is lovely. Thank you.

[larryhammer]

I was struck by it ...

[cmcmck]

She's unfamiliar to me and this is rather nice.

[larryhammer]

I'm not surprised she's unfamiliar -- except for a few appearances in early 20th century anthologies, her poetic presence has more or less evaporated.