the hard hours.

I'd like to share a poem with you. We had to read it for my "Literary Bible" seminar. I think it's absolutely beautiful. And once you know the background story, it's even more powerful. So here's the story:

The poet, Anthony Hecht, went through a pretty brutal divorce. After everything was finalized, his ex-wife moved halfway around the world to Israel and took both of his sons with her. Realizing he would never get to see his sons again, he wrote this:

"The Hard Hours"

"'Adam, my child, my son,

These very words you hear

Compose the fish and starlight

Of your untroubled dream.

When you awake, my child,

It shall all come true.

Know that it was for you

That all things were begun.'

"Adam, my child, my son,

Thus spoke Our Father in heaven

To his first, fabled child,

The father of us all.

And I, your father, tell

The words over again

As innumerable men

From ancient times have done.

"Tell them again in pain,

And to the empty air.

Where you are men speak

A different mother tongue.

Will you forget our games,

Our hide-and-seek and song?

Child, it will be long

Before I see you again.

"Adam, there will be

Many hard hours,

As an old poem says,

Hours of loneliness.

I cannot ease them for you;

They are our common lot.

During them, like as not,

You dream of me.

"When you are crouched away

In a strange clothes closet

Hiding from one who's "It"

And the dark crowds in,

Do not be afraid -

O, if you can, believe

In a father's love

That you shall know some day.

"Think of the summer rain

Or seedpearls of the mist;

Seeing the beaded leaf,

Try to remember me.

From far away

I send my blessing out

To circle the great globe.

It shall reach you yet."