To whom her next poem is written remains a mystery.
Since there are no direct references to anything I’ve written, this could simply be a poem addressed to herself, although it actually appears to continue a discussion with someone over the nature of life, the other person calling a situation complicated, while she maintains it is simple – but with caveats.
Since I can find no reference to any argument I made, I’m assuming this poem is to someone else, someone who also reads her poetry.
Still the title implies a stealth relationship, similar to the “clever and illusive” bit she stuck at the end of one of her poems last fall, a fleeting glimpse of something in passing, rather than anything direct.
Happiness, which lies on the edges of perception, does not last, and this secret it to enjoy those brief moments when it exists while they can.
This may well be a reference to a relationship she is involved in, something separated from the main action of her life, yet still connected – perhaps the same man she was involved with previously, whose marriage got in the way.
Although I’ll likely come back to this with a fuller analysis, the poem essentially says life is what it is and she can’t change it, and it is a ride she on until it ends, and will have high and low moment, and rare moments of unthinking peace.
The poem is written to someone with whom she has shared some kind of dream, but which has slipped away or impossible to obtain (possibly reverting back to that series of love and breakup poems she posted previously).
You can almost hear him telling her “it’s complicated,” a catch phrase for uncertain relationships – possibly alluding to his wife.
She sees the situation as an aspect of life, perfectly simple, even if impossible to attain.
The opening lines suggest that they are in the ending steps of long dance, which has moved far from the original glitter romance had originally promised and suggests that what they had together was merely “a gifted glance into a life that is not ours.”
Again, suggesting that they can’t have what they originally thought they could, he reverting to idea that the situation is complicated, when she says it’s simple, it is fate or whatever, that brings her once more back to the same place, her lot in life.
In life, she said, there are moments “quick, shocking, unexpected, beautiful” that are awe-ful, terrifying trysts of what they want yet is deceptive, “glittering in front, behind and in our periphery.”
And there are moments when they are so full of awe, they forget, and let it be, “when we forget all else” and just are alive,” and the struggle is to remain unthinking for as long as possible. “There is nothing else.”
The first stanza suggests that this is something secret, and that they need to be wary,” and they see something grand in their affair and are drawn to it, but ultimately, it can’t be sustained – and this is not unusual for her.
Her life is a “circumscribed circle” and seems to place boundaries on her. She can operate freely within those boundaries but can never escape it. She ultimately ends up at the same place. And the poem suggests that they need to appreciate what they have, while they have it, and forget everything else during those brief moments.
The glitter is always beyond reach, something they see out of the corner of their eye, drawing them to it, only to ultimately get disappointed.
Yet, while they are in the midst of it, they can forget everything, must forget that it cannot last.
If this poem is about the same affair as she alluded to in other poems, she is once more making a case to have their cake while the can, knowing that in the end, he will return to his life with his wife.
Happiness comes in small brief, glorious doses, but it is like the illusive butterfly of love, lingering beyond reach, glittering behind and in front, but most of all at the edges of eye sight so when you try to pin it down, it vanishes.
The secret is to live with the illusion, to enjoy those brief moments, and forget they must come to an end.
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