Alone

Don’t ask me how it might have been, or what it could or should have been like.How different all my days would be if I’d strode securely into public sunlight. More and more I take the sun alone – always at the edge of the clearing, close enough to the wood to crouch low or retreat at ease should the beautiful enemy pass by.

If these pages are so personal and private, why  let them go? There is a chance, however small that some one will read, understand, even stop and turn in my direction.-  Rod McKuen

That moment when you find another book on your wish list and you shout with joy, a muffled sound of a Yes, I’m so lucky and grinning like crazy while hugging the book close. It’s as if you can’t believe your eyes that you’ve found another treasure. Nice meeting you again Rod McKuen! I wonder if I could sleep tonight. I just want to read your poems and lose myself in your words and in your world.

The last time I encountered Rod McKuen was   several years ago. I chanced upon his book  Seasons in the Sun  in one of my forays at National Bookstore  back then. I didn’t even know that he was the one who composed the same song that was so popular during the seventies.  That book was one of the  most read books on my shelf and losing it was like losing a good friend and companion at  times when I need a word or two to make me smile  and to look at life with  wide open eyes. This afternoon I was lucky though to find Alone, another book on my wish list which is really hard to find in local bookstores nowadays  because it was published in 1979. Gosh, talk about being really, really lucky.

Actually I bought five more books all at P29.00 pesos each, really at a bargain price, if you ask me. I bought two books by Barbara Cartland, one by Carol Quinto and a copy of Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery. Of course, we all know that the latter is a classic and the rest are regency romance books. I was in high school when I started reading  Barbara Cartland, all books borrowed from our school library. Come to think of it, those were the kind of books I used to read in high school but I never owned a Barbara Cartland book  in my whole life until now. This fascination for English titles though somehow didn’t completely wane through the years because it became a real-life fascination for real-life prince and princess, kings and queens not only from England but in other countries as well. I followed Lady Di’s story until her death five years ago. I read a book on Grace Kelly, dubbed as the American princess although I haven’t even seen any of her movie pictures. And I did have a chance to see a royal couple during my college years in UST when then Princess Sofia and Prince Carlos visited the university. They are now the King and Queen of Spain.

Going back to Rod McKuen’s book, I’d like to quote one of his poems here because it reminds me of a picture I took one sunny afternoon about three years ago. It is an amateurish shot of a flock of birds passing by.

One Day I’ll Follow the Birds

One day I’ll follow the birds

disappearing into the rain

going in a hurry, then gone

glad to be in flight again

not sure why I’m running.

There are some wounds

I never speak about.

Some things that words

have done to me

that none will ever know.

But one gray day

I’ll follow a funeral out-of-town

on the heels of the birds

disappearing into the rain.

I love, love Rod McKuen 🙂

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