A Dream in the Luxembourg
Richard Aldington
I've taken the editorial license of starting this at Stanza IV rather than at the Prologue.
IV
It was five on a sunny afternoon, And I sat on one of those uncomfortable iron chairs Under the trees of the Luxembourg, Rather apart from the crowd, So that the passing people seemed like trees moving, And the children playing, like graceful forest animals; In the distance I could see the wavering fountain jet, Always rising and always falling in foamy parabolas Like the path of a comet fixed in tremulous water. And all this I am trying to tell you Is the day-dream which suddenly came to me Quite unawares, as a poem springs up fountain-like When one is not even thinking of a poem. In an hour I lived through my dream, And it was so vivid, so intense, that I saw and heard nothing Of the people and the children and the trees and the sunlight, But saw only my dream That is why I am telling it As if it had really happened, and were not merely a dream; And also because, like an incantation, Desire put into words may control reality...
About the Poem
Aldington dedicated his poem "For B.", Brigit Patmore, a married English author and socialite, who introduced him to the literary world and with whom he had a ten year relationship.
About Richard Aldington
Richard Aldington came from a literary English family, fought in World War I as a front-line officer, and had numerous affairs as part of the bed-swapping English literary scene.
His poetry and prose dealt mostly with the evils of war and the pleasures and pains of sexual romance.
He was married to the author, Hilda Doolittle (HD) and Netta McCullough. He had one legitimate child, Catherine.
His iconoclastic biography of the celebrated T.E. Lawrence led to his rejection by the English public which took years to mend.
And through which his good friend Lawrence Durrell, author of the Alexandria Quartet, stood by him.
As one of the "War Poets" Richard Aldington is memorialized in the Poet's corner of Westminster Abbey.
Special Books
My Friends When Young: The Memoirs of Bridget Patmore Derek Patmore, ed., William Heinemann Ltd, 1968
Literary Lifelines - The Richard Aldington Lawrence Durrell Correspondence Ian S. MacNiven & Harry T. Moore, ed. Viking Press, 1981
Special
One of the many things for which I must thank my mother is her introducing me to the poetry of Richard Aldington.