Love Triangle
(Wherein Priscilla Mullins Speaks Candidly to John Alden)
How is it that you come to me today at his behest?
If your nature were more cynical, I’d say it was a jest
that the one for whom affection beats so surely in my breast
approaches asking favor for another suitor’s quest.
Have you, John, decided that you will seek a rest
from your own fond yearnings, abandoning them lest
your friend and fellow suitor’s hopes you might arrest?
Your words are an anomaly that put me to the test,
yet up is never down, my love, and east is never west.
Forsake the words there on your lips. Convey what you’ve repressed.
It’s our initials on the linen in my wedding chest!
I’ll don my veil and you, dear one, will don your wedding vest.
You’ll graduate from best man simply to the man who’s best,
and instead of groom your friend will be our honored wedding guest.
(After “The Courtship of Miles Standish” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. The only concise plot summary I could find was from a film based on the poem, but the plot line is the same. Illustration from The Courtship of Miles Standish. The famous retort in the poem when John acts as Miles Standish’s go-between is, “Why don’t you speak for yourself, John?”)
Today’s words were graduate, anomaly, cynical and jest. Here are the links:
https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2019/05/17/rdp-friday-graduate/
https://fivedotoh.com/2019/05/17/fowc-with-fandango-anomaly/
https://onedailyprompt.wordpress.com/2019/05/17/your-daily-word-prompt-cynical-may-17-2019/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2019/05/17/jest/
I hate stories and movies that are based on one person lying to protect someone else. They always end in years of misery when simply have an honest conversation would have done the job.
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Have you read The Courtship of Miles Standish? It’s more a Cyrano de Bergerac theme..not really about someone lying to protect someone else.
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Sometimes I just don’t know how you do it
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Sometimes I don’t know, either, Derrick. How I came to write about the Courtship of Miles Standish I will never know!!! It’s like a sort of possession. The words group together and prod me in certain directions where I would never stray on my own. Sort of like when you daughter determines your ride for the day….
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🙂
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What a sassy girl… the right way to reward the lies.
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I like how you summed up the story in this delightful poem!
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Thanks, Eilene..
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That was so clever, Judy!
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I’m so glad that someone else has read The Courtship of Miles Standish! Or do I presume too much?
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I have read it years ago in Russian translation and never got around to re-reading in English.
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