I am not yours, nor lost in you, not lost, although I long to be. Lost as a candle lit at noon, lost as a snowflake in the sea. You love me, and I find you still a spirit beautiful and bright, yet I am I, who long to be lost as a light is lost in light.
Interpretation
The quote expresses a yearning for deep connection while acknowledging individuality.
In this quote, Sara Teasdale reflects on the complex nature of love and longing, conveying a desire to merge with someone while also cherishing individuality. The imagery of being 'lost' in light and comparing oneself to a candle and snowflake illustrates the delicate balance between wanting to lose oneself in love and maintaining one's own identity.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech about the nature of love during a wedding.
As the waves of perfume, heliotrope, rose, _x000D_ _x000D_ Float in the garden when no wind blows, _x000D_ _x000D_ Come to us, go from us, whence no one knows; _x000D_ _x000D_ So the old tunes float in my mind, _x000D_ _x000D_ And go from me leaving no trace behind, _x000D_ _x000D_ Like fragrance borne on the hush of the wind.
From my spirit's gray defeat, From my pulse's flagging beat, From my hopes that turned to sand Sifting through my close-clenched hand, From my own fault's slavery, If I can sing, I still am free. For with my singing I can make A refuge for my spirit's sake, A house of shining words, to be My fragile immortality.
I thought of you and how you love this beauty, And walking up the long beach all alone I heard the waves breaking in measured thunder As you and I once heard their monotone. Around me were the echoing dunes, beyond me The cold and sparkling silver of the sea -- We two will pass through death and ages lengthen Before you hear that sound again with me.
Lyric night of the lingering Indian Summer, Shadowy fields that are scentless but full of singing, Never a bird, but the passionless chant of insects, Ceaseless, insistent. The grasshopper's horn, and far-off, high in the maples, The wheel of a locust leisurely grinding the silence Under a moon waning and worn, broken, Tired with summer.
Let it be forgotten, as a flower is forgotten, Forgotten as a fire that once was singing gold, Let it be forgotten forever and ever, Time is a kind friend, he will make us old.
For I shall learn from flower and leaf, That color every drop they hold, To change the lifeless wine of grief To living gold.
Only do not forget, if I wake up crying it's only because in my dream I'm a lost child hunting through the leaves of the night for your hands.
I pretended indifference…even in the presence of love, in the presence of hunger. And the more deeply I felt, the less able I was to respond.
Any day spent with you is my favorite day. So today is my new favorite day.
Explain! Tell a man to explain how he dropped into hell! Explain my preference! I never had a PREFERENCE for her, any more than I have a preference for breathing. No other woman exists by the side of her. I would rather touch her hand if it were dead, than I would touch any other woman's living.
Love is like the lightning, and your maturity is signaled by the extent to which you can accept the dangers and the power and the beauty of love.
In love longing I listen to the monk's bell. I will never forget you even for an interval short as those between the bell notes.
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