You have the power of standing still
No speed of wind or water rushing by
But you have a speed far greater. You can climb
Back up a stream of radiance to the sky,
And back through history up the stream of time.
And you were given this swiftness, not for haste
Nor chiefly that you may go where you will.
But in the rush of everything to waste,
That you may have the power of standing still—
Off any still or moving thing you say.
Two such as you with a master speed
Cannot be parted nor be swept away
From one another once you are agreed
That life is only life forevermore
Together wing to wing and oar to oar.
-Robert Frost, "The Master Speed"
A woman named Carroll Ann emailed recently to ask if I could meet her downtown and sign the many copies of Life is a Verb she had bought as holiday gifts for her family and friends. I am always happy to do that, always.
We sat for a wonderful cup of coffee at Malaprop's bookstore downtown and talked. She had created amazing, gorgeous journals to accompany the book, and shared them with me. Beautiful, whimsical journals with tiny cut outs and quotes pasted in and small sticks and ribbon adorning the spiral binding.
As we readied to leave, she said she had some free hugs for me, in the form of two poems printed on lovely vellum paper. One (are you sitting down because this will shock you) a favorite by Billy Collins and one a poem by Robert Frost that I had never read, the one you just read. "It was read at a family wedding," she explained and as I read it, the power of it as a wedding poem was clear to me, but I thought it was much more, too. As we hustle and bustle around, particularly at this time of year, it occurs to me that there is power in standing still. We have the power of standing still.
There was, I hasten to add, a (dare I say gorgeous) photo of Mr. Depp printed at the bottom of the page.
