CANTO 45
April was a cruel month. Laura died on the 6th in Avignon, 1348 Dead. Gone and took his heart. And him feeling dead & gone complained of love to Love. My Laura's alive, living in Halifax. April was cruel. And May. June, now, O pleasure, O torment. "I have," She writes, "been thinking about you a great deal since I last saw you. It just is not often that I have such a strong attraction and immediate feeling for someone who, as you said, is also good company. I walk out to look at the stars and hope to run into you, fantasize that you will sneak into my room late night. Of course much is now fantasy and projection-who knows what it would really be like to be together. Every time I have seen you it has stirred me and disturbed me and left me with thoughts of you for days afterward, but I was also more able to keep myself in check by knowing that we agreed it was not
right for us to have a relationship and knowing that it is not something you are even looking for.
And likely it still is not right for us, but what you said when I saw you made it seem more possible (even though I tell myself that it is probably the fact that
I am leaving that let us feel free to say what we did). I hope I am not telling you too much here." Dear Reader, my Laura's words Era Day soft sun thru clouds Guard down. Taken up & shaken vostr'occhi vost' voice (What is the Italian for this?) gait great grace mi legaro Donna (four lines of bad road omitted here) 4 years of bad luck, chance ? The chance of She My eye an open highway to the heart my ear our auras tears Eros penetrated ferir me de saetta she in mind of someone on her arm & so spoken for, cloud cover yielding but one single ray, yet spoke. the Petrarchian yoyo I love her, I hate her Will she be ready when the time is ripe? When she wants me, will I want to see her? What IS my intent? What the hand that made this mess? "Thanks for coming to see me. Obviously I was having a hard time speaking because I was nervous. Scared of my having such a strong attraction to you and admitting it, afraid that once I admit it I make things more real, and that I have to be sure that what I say is true, scared of kissing with you and not having told Jeff (because I
have never been deceitful that way to anyone I have been romantically involved with and I wonder what that means). And I felt nervous about our age difference. And it makes me nervous that it is easier
to write what I feel than say it, so I write more than I would say. But mostly right now I want not to talk or write to you but rather to kiss you and be kissed."