Love After Love
~ by Derek Walcott
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror,
and each will smile at the other’s welcome,
and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was yourself.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you
all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,
the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.
Derek Walcott (1930-2017) won the 1992 Nobel Prize for Literature. A poet and playwright, he was born in Saint Lucia and later moved to Trinidad. He received numerous awards for his poetry. May this poem bring you a feast of life and love.
(Picture by Jorge Mejía peralta from Managua, Nicaragua – IMG_1165poesia, CC BY 2.0, Link)
Happy Valentine’s Day!