SOPHIA DE MELLO BREYNER ANDRESEN

Someone called Yara sent this to my husband’s Red Hand Files. It’s such an incredibly sweet letter and the poem is lovely. I’ve never seen it before. I love it that people send things in. Thank you for leaving these golden mice at our door. And thank you, Yara. Love, Susie x

Dear Nick,

I love the poems that Susie shares on the Stuff Page, I read and reread them and sometimes daydream about them. Actually I love everything on the Stuff Page. It’s a genuine and warm space.

In return, I send you this poem by Sophia De Mello Breyner Andresen. Send my love to Susie. Yara.

The Perfect Hour 

This is the perfect hour when a hush descends

On our muted human murmurings

And inside us finally there speaks

The grave voice of indolent dreams.

This is the hour when roses are the roses

That flowered in the Persian gardens

Where Saadi and Hafiz saw and loved them.

This is the hour of the mysterious voices

Chosen and summoned by my desires.

This is the hour of the long conversations

Held between leaf and leaf.

This is the hour when time is abolished

And I do not even know my own face.

 

By Sophia De Mello Breyner Andresen