Richard Pierce

Richard Pierce – author, poet, painter

Life, Poetry, Writing

Day 127

So I found the poem to the unknown woman in Avignon. It was August 1987. Memory is not an exact time until you find the evidence. A bit like emotions. I’m quite struck by the last two lines, because I have never stopped telling the story. And this morning my mind is more like – she probably left it on the table, or took it home and ripped it up. Who knows? Who cares? It’s a good story, regardless. Excuse any mistakes in the French. This was the 27-year-old boy whose second fiancee had just split up with him.

Strange and illuminating to see I addressed her in the polite form, vous instead of tu. I have always been backward in coming forward. I even had to add a sex scene to Dead Men because my publisher thought the love was lacking without the consummation.

Ironic that her poem was written on the half of the menu with the main courses on it, and I scribbled my copy onto the dessert half. Note, though, that the poem was written with a fountain pen. I travelled round Europe with a fountain pen?

Would you accept a poem from this man?

Excuse this reflection, but for me, it does point at my roots, the emotion and impulses (and most of them good, surprisingly) that have always driven my writing. Perhaps this is why there hasn’t been a bestseller, because I allow myself to be driven rather than calculate.

On this grey and rainy morning, these are good memories to be having, memories of that hot summer in Europe in 1987, when my best friends, as always, GT, MW, and GA, carried me and my broken heart around France and Italy carefully, and nurtured me back into some kind of health.

Memories of friendship, cigarettes, and coffee.

 

AGGIE’S ART OF HAPPINESS – CHAPTER 83

 

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2 Comments

  1. Ren Powell

    7th May 2022 at 12:51

    I have forgotten all my high school French but this is great!
    And. Yes. I would.

    1. Richard Pierce

      7th May 2022 at 15:44

      Thank you. Thank. You. Rx

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