Occasional Poems for the Lovely Isobel
66
A quiet evening by the seaside,
quite an evening by your side.
We hear the roaring waves, yet we don't
fear them -- we have all we want.
The sun retreats, a second ticks, and
One counts sixty years and six.
The route to wisdom, hair of silver,
roots in love and grows in her.
65
A long happy day,
a stroll by the tide
along Heron Way
with me by your side.
A nest in the West
when you're sixty five.
A good time to rest,
a good place to thrive.
62
Just when you finally catch up
I start to move t'ward sixty-three.
I seem to pull you every year
out of the now that you can see
into the then yet to appear.
And so we journey on perplexed
one step before the other's next.
But drawing back to see the whole
we find we're bound in flesh and soul.
We'll walk together, push and pull,
into a future rich and full.
61
At sweet eleven Isobel was fair
And kind and lovely in her innocence;
At twenty-one she was a beauty rare,
Her hair cascading past her shoulders thence.
You knew at thirty-one she'd always be
A gentle presence to her children round;
A steady partner through the years was she
At forty-one, a precious treasure found.
Beyond the home, at fifty-one, she'd see
A path for prayer and peace and people skills;
And now at sixty-one maturity
Has her awaiting what the Father wills.
A life well-lived each passing decade proves
How she will flourish where she stays or moves.
On her birthday, 2021
On our forty-first Anniversary
On our forty-first Anniversary
another year has passed away.
A rounded number has caché,
yet forty-three is what's today.
The sights and sounds along the way--
a child, a song, the ocean spray--
make out of ordinary clay
the love of this extraordinary day.
A Valentine
My love, my Isobel, is fresh as Spring,
A fragrant breeze that blows through greening trees
And whistles, coaxing meadow larks to sing;
She's fresh as Spring and mine to hold and please.
My love, my Isobel, is Summer's glow,
The sunshine smiling on a quiet pond
Reflecting dappled light where rushes grow;
She's Summer's glow and mine to seal the bond.
My love, my Isobel, makes Autumn feel
Like all the colours in our lives are rife
With glories, each one making its appeal;
She makes the Autumn feel to me like life.
When Winter's coming threatens cold and dearth
She'll be to me a fire in the hearth.
Valentine's Day, 2021