A poem that I lost

[lazariuk]

Back in high school I was
once instructed to write a poem and I think it was sport's week and I was
to write on long distance running. The title i gave my poem was "The
Lonesome Run of Ramon Lull" In this poem I tried to imagine what was going through
his mind while he ran. I no longer have a copy of the poem but I remember the
story and was reminded of it when I read something about Irving Layton's wife's
black facial hairs. Thats a sign of ADD.

Ramon Lull was a Spanish poet of great fame and his area of focus was
romance. All across the countryside his name it did resound and from
far and wide the ladies would dream their dreams that Ramon or one like
him would come into their lives and hearts and beds.

One day Ramon passed through a simple village and spied quite by
accident the face of one who shown deep into his heart. He turned
toward her and she fled. He followed and she ran.

This had never happened to him before and it served to only inflame his
passion deeper. He waited at her gate.

Not only did he wait but he wrote poems, he wrote songs and he wrote
letters all telling her of the flame of love burning so deeply within
him and of the joys that would be hers if she would open her own heart
to him.

Weeks passed.

She remained silent. Sometimes coming to the window but after seeing
that Ramon was always waiting and seeing that the sight of her seemed
to deepen his passion, she stopped coming.

Ramon was desperate, slowly sinking deeper into hell, a hell that it
seemed that only she could free him from. He bagan uttering words that
he had never uttered before, at least not truthfully, he promised his
undying love, and complete faithfullness. He offered her his hand in
marriage and swore by everything that he had ever held sacred that his
heart and words were true.

The door opened and a messanger came to him with a note from her, who
was the sun in his sky, and that note was a shaft of light from that
sun and he impaled his heart upon that shaft of light and was lifted to
the door of heaven.

The note requested that he meet her in a desolute part of the forest,
in private. The note said that she would accept his offer if his love
were true.

Oh the joy !! ( I won't describe the joy he felt because I can't)

Later that day at the beginning of twilight they met at the appointed
spot.

And now we look at HER face for the first time. Her long black hair against
the darkening trees and as we start noticing her enchanting beauty we
get drawn to what seems like the hopes and dreams and fears of all of
humanity in her eyes. We can't take our gaze away from those eyes and,
as the dampness of her eyelashes grow, our heart gets torn open with
the realization that here are tears.

We get hit by a flood of confusion and as we scramble to piece together
our exploding universe we see that during these seconds that we were
lost in her eyes she had been undoing the buttons of her shirt. Our
eyes move from her eyes over the smooth line of her nose, across her
lush lips where framed by white pearls we see a fleeting glimse of her
tongue.
The movement in her neck tells us that she is turning her head away as
our eyes pass and come to rest on her breast. The breast was rotting of
cancer.

Ramon Lull never spoke a word to her and he eventually turned and ran.
The poem I wrote for my high school class was what I imagined was
going through his mind as he ran. I wrote about the flood of grace that
can be released by going to the end of love. I got a lousy mark and was
told that I seemed to be missing the point of sport's week.

I had some idea of what was going through his mind because both history
and he recorded in detail much of his life. He went on to become one of
Spain's greatest teachers and spiritual advisors. I think he bacame a
saint.

But of her, history reamins silent, and we don't get the poems of
Irving Layton telling us what Faye experienced when her heart's desire
sat staring at the black hairs growing from her chin and then running
from her life.

[daka]

He ran not from her
But from his own impure mind

Thanks for the great little tale

daka

[lazariuk]

He ran not from her
But from his own impure mind

Yes, maybe, I know a little about him. It is more her that I want to know about. What makes it so hard to know about the people who are rejected is that we reject them.

[William]

Have you read "The loneliness of the Long Distance Runner?"
Excellent novella.

[mickey_one]

Have you read "The loneliness of the Long Distance Runner?"
Excellent novella.

and an excellent film with a great lead by Tom Courtenay and a wondrous soundtrack to accompany his runs.

[lazariuk]

Have you read "The loneliness of the Long Distance Runner?"
Excellent novella.

No but I do remember that the title was enough to give me the idea of what poem I would write for sport's week.
Jack