I wore that perfume then! How it evokes
The memories of a night! Near fifty years
Have passed, and still I feel the things I felt.
The time was nearly Christmas; summer night
Laden with languid heat, the party held
Down by the water, in a dream-lit yard.
(The dreams, as I remember, were all mine,
Inchoate, helpless, fresh and sharp and strong,
And innocent as newly-mint sixteen.)
So little I recall: what dress? What food?
Only the perfume, and the magic sense
Of entering a world I had not known.
No, nothing happened, not a prince was there,
(At least not mine); only the summer night,
The velvet darkness sequinned with small lamps,
The heady mix of freedom and soft dreams,
The first toe stuck out into life’s glad stream,
And all the joys and sorrows yet to come.
The river of the years has borne me on
Without regret, for she still lives inside:
The dreaming girl who sees the beautiful
In every moment’s gift, still tender-glad
To be and to become: to reach, to love.
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