The Valentine Heart
Posted on 07. Feb, 2008 by Barry Hurd in Author's Favorites, Coffee - Volume Two, Love, Romantic
I won a bottle of wine for having a wee bit of knowledge about the origin and meaning surrounding the word Valentine. I guess being able to answer a few multiple choice questions about an interesting day is worth a bottle of wine for a poet.
Here is a recap of some writing I did a few years ago, along with a new poem:
A history of Valentine.
While Valentine’s day is a marketing woe for modern society, it has a wonderful history that is colored in myth and legend. Everything from the bow of Cupid to the down fall of European nations.
A good portion of historical reference lead us to St. Valentine, a third-century priest who had a reputation for performing marriage ceremonies that had been banned by the Roman emperor. Valentine was thrown into jail, who as legends go, formed a relationship with the jailor’s daughter and he wrote his last message to her “From your Valentine” a phrase which would persists through-out a thousand years. St Valentine found his death on February 14th, in the year 270, and his remains and some of his writings are displayed in Dublin at Carmelite Church.
A thousand years later- Charles, the duke of Orleans, wrote a valentine to his with while imprisoned in the Tower of London. Aside from the origin of St Valentine, the letter is on display at the British Library as the first recorded valentine in 1415.
Years later, regardless of the origin or how many have been sent, Valentine’s day still lives on as we all embrace a moment of personal recollection, hope, love, and faithful spirit to the people we embrace.
The Valentine Heart
This prison,
The place I am locked into
By feverish want,
And things I could not let go.
This is a place of recollection,
The harbinger of reality,
Where reality and dreams reside,
Trying to live within each other.
I want to look outside
yet the walls are solid,
And my sight is obscured,
By images left unseen.
Each day, every minute
Of every hour,
I beg for mercy,
From a soul who made this dream.
My only possession,
The wanting hope,
Of finding my release,
As I give the truest of myself.
A kind warden has graced me,
With an elegant quill
to write my thoughts,
Upon this parchment of my soul.
When my feelings become words,
My heart finds escape,
it finds itself free and elated,
as it ventures amongst the heavens.
If this day, dear saint,
Can release me from this cell,
Where my hope dwells,
And my heart finds your embrace.