Farewell

On this day, my last at the Villa, I'd like to share with you a farewell poem written by a former colleague of mine who left the Villa back in 2009. I liked it then, and I like it even more now that I have to say my own goodbye.

Farewell
Sirens
In their mournful wake
Bid me their farewell
As I sail eastward
Into the dark and nebulous passage
Charted by no map in the world
But the one carved into my heart.

I still remember
A lonesome villa by the sea
That seems quite so long ago...
For even memories can get old
But the heart withers not
Neither is it afraid of age’s blows
Nor fades away in the hours’ passing storms.

Smiles and whispers,
Tears and laughter,
Some as fleeting as a lovely sunset
Some lasting like the sights
Of those beautiful gallery teachers
Let me be drunk in those reveries
Beneath the Dionysos’ sky.

Regards and thank you all
For the memories
Bright and rare,
For the stories
You’ve chosen to share,
For the white and travertine,
And, why not, for the coffee and lemon tea.

Farewell...
To the marble halls,
To the winter’s early night falls,
To the spring’s rousing signs,
To the garden full of thyme,
To the summer’s brightest rays
To the autumn’s lovely gray.

To the sirens’ melodies fine,
To the clouds in the bluest sky,
To the yellow marble steps,
To the gallery teachers gorgeous,
To the rows of sycamores,
To the strands of soft willows
Bless me now, Hermes, I shall go.

--Myat Noe (2009)

Within These Halls

Ancient survivors are gathered protectively within these historic halls.

Made elite by the accident of their preservation, here representatives of earthly alien

   civilizations stand sentry;

Objects peculiar and enigmatic to the crowds of gazers who float directionless and dazed

   through the cool airy corridors and vaulting galleries.

In this exceptional place aloof remnants of remote pasts, though silent, actively seek

   to live again in mortal imaginations.

Most passing minds remain dark; the murmuring gazers are nearly all cursory

   in their explorations.

Pallid, rigored bodies of cold marble, bronze festering with inexorable green decay, and

   jagged shards—the orphaned red and black wreckage of once-elegant flowing clay lines—

Remain insensible and meaningless under fleeting, incurious glances.

And yet the survivors are not frustrated in their pursuit.

A skilled and studied few walk among the gazers, speaking history, sparking understanding

   and recognition and igniting new, living meanings in the minds of those who draw near.

The very breath of their words resuscitates these ruined remnants of past centuries, and the

   survivors breathe once more.

If only for a moment, the passions, beauties, terrors, and toils of a distant and dead antique

   live again.

AMW

August 2012

Halloween Poetry

A couple of years ago, I was going through old papers and such, and I ran across a very old green spiral notebook with one of my early literary efforts preserved in it. It's not Shakespeare, but it made me smile--in third grade my homeroom was classroom #3, and my class was known for being a bit rowdy. I reproduce the poem here, just as I found it. Hopefully it will make you smile too... Happy Halloween!

The Ghost of Classroom #3

by Amber Myers (age 8)

There’s a tapping at the window,

A moaning at the door,

And something ectoplasmic

Is sticking to the floor…

But don’t panic, don’t be frightened

By anything you see,

It’s really nothing special,

Just the Ghost of Classroom Three.

It doesn’t come out often,

Just once or twice a year,

It wanders around then,

Poof!

It disappears.

Sometimes it sits at the desk,

Marking books continuously,

But it’s really nothing special,

Just the Ghost of Classroom Three.

Some say it was a teacher

Who met a nasty end,

She had a class of nasty kids

That drove her around the bend.

And sometimes there is screaming,

And it weeps dismally,

But it’s really nothing special,

Just the Ghost of Classroom Three.

She swore she’d come and haunt them,

But they laughed and didn’t care,

And now she haunts the cupboard

(Which otherwise is bare).

And sometimes there are others,

A whole classroom full you can see,

Doing endless homework

For the Ghost of Classroom Three.

Some say it isn’t possible,

And it’s just a story,

But classroom three you must admit,

Feels different, sort of eerie.

And once upon the blackboard,

Someone wrote mysteriously,

‘I’ll haunt this school forever,

I’m the Ghost of Classroom Three.’

There’s a rapping at the desktops,

A rattling at the door,

And something is trying to get out

Of the teacher’s locked desk drawer.

But don’t panic, don’t be frightened,

Don’t scare too easily,

It’s really nothing special,

Just the Ghost of Classroom Three.