primeiro poema de John Lyons para Anna Chiara

Anna Chiara

You do not speak my language,

not yet at least.

But your eyes

-dark pools of liquid light-

are big and beautiful.

Were I to compare your eyes

to any precious stone

or any

distant stars

that shed their light

on a summer’s evening,

I would,

as a poet,

be failing you, failing

their beauty.

Some things in life

are true and pointless.

Not you,

nor your innocence,

nor your beauty. You are

who and what you are, and

you are the joy of love

unconfined.

Your tiny hands reach out

as you ask for your drink,

your pert mouth agape,

milk teeth

barely piercing your bony gums.

First steps,

first teeth,

first words:

this is the so-called learning curve

of infancy.

But it is not that simple.

Are parents the first teachers

of their children,

or is it the reverse?

Of love you have nothing to learn

and everything

to teach. There is

love in the first laughter,

the first smile, the first games,

and you will remind us

as you call

to your mother and father that love

is the first and only reason for words.

If beauty is truth -and these are only words-

the love that illuminates

your fresh young skin

will remain everlasting,

and that purest of loves

which makes us

ageless, timeless will

be manifest every day of your life

from here and to eternity.

**27 December 2000**