The Lovers’ Chronicle 19 July – listenin’ – death of Petrarch – art by Edgar Degas

Dear Zazie,  Here is today’s Lovers’ Chronicle from Mac Tag to his muse.  Visit us on twitter @cowboycoleridge.  Are you listenin’? Ciao, Rhett

The Lovers’ Chronicle

Dear Muse,

listen to the dream…
The last time i checked, our bedroom
did not have a tomb, says the lovely redhead
no my love, welcome to our latest dream,
this is Petrarch’s tomb in Arquà Petrarca, Italy
Ah that makes sense, one of your heroes
yes, the father of unrequited love,
sure thought that was my destiny
-He slips his hand into hers, she leans
into him and they hear a song begin;
“Don’t you feel it growin’ day by day?
People gettin’ ready for the news
Some are happy, some are sad…”
well this is the place to lay those days to rest,
and give thanks for the verse provided
Yes my love, now let’s listen to what’s calling
absolutely, there is a winery just down the road,
Loreggian, are you ready Cara Mia
Andiamo, amore mio

© copyright 2024.2025 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

goin’ with the first song that came to mind,
though i had to look up who recorded it,
’’Listen to Your Heart’’ recorded by Roxette
with Marie Fredriksson on vocals
and written by Per Gessle and Mats Persson
’’I remember, have to love 80’s rock ballads’’
we were listenin’, from the day we met
’’And we’ve known where we’re going’’
and we know why, as long as we keep listenin’

© copyright 2023.2024 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

another relapse; hey, appears this is becomin’ part of the routine, to write you, you know about my routines, all these words keep comin’ and i  have to do somethin’ with them; did you hear, or is could, the right question, s’pose these post mortems are macabre, perhaps pointless, given the one way diaogue; i know this; it takes two to listen, wish we had both been

© copyright 2022.2023 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

upon the first star
i see tonight
thinkin’
the thoughts
that interweave
the possibilities
and choices
that await

what now, which way
wherefore i throw a wish
to find out if i might

and i listen
i will hear you
in order to be
even for a moment

to keep choosin’ you

© copyright 2021 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

Pale Love, Pale Rider

a fine reminder
that it takes two
whatever the endeavor
particularly this one

in regards to the two
most important “ships”;
relationships
and friendships

i could not hear
for the longest time
why it took nearly
a lifetime to write

also explains
why i am quiet

i need to hear the words
to give them to you

© copyright 2020.2023 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

i search and find
and it comes on

i have to because
i have ideas runnin’
through my head
that i do not know
how to describe

whatever it is that pulls,
past the ordinariness
even for a moment,
it is enough

contemplatin’
pictures made
in order to be
anything we need

© copyright 2019 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

here again
to choose you

only one way
to close these thoughts
and the path that leads them
where they must go

perhaps
some sort of madness,
but is there not
some reason as well

whatever it is that pulls,
past the ordinariness
even for a moment,
it is enough

listen still

© copyright 2018 mag tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

on the prairie
at night alone
stars comin’ on
thinkin’ the thoughts
that interweave
the possibilities
and choices
that await

a whisper,
what now, which way
wherefore i threw a wish
to find out if i might

and i listen
and listen still

none wise enough
to find out all there is
and is not
certainly i

but i will still
be listenin’ for you
till the stars fade away
and the shadows take the moon

© copyright 2017 mac tag/cowboy Coleridge all rights reserved

“I hope you find peace”
Ah yes, peace
Quite the elusive lover
But I found her
When I realized
The verse is all
That matters to me

© copyright 2016 mac tag/cowboy Coleridge all rights reserved

Today, a day in history story of unrequited love, my favorite kind.  On this day in 1374, scholar, poet, humanist, “The Father of Humanism”, “The Father of the Renaissance”, Petrarch died at his home in Arquà Petrarca, Veneto, Italy one day before his 70th birthday.  Born Francesco Petrarca on 20 July 1304 in Arezzo, Tuscany, Italy.  He rediscovered many Ancient Greek and Roman writers and his belief that there was no real conflict between Classical and Christian thought anticipated the Renaissance spirit.  He did not see a conflict between realizing humanity’s potential and having religious faith.

Petrarch is perhaps best known for his Il Canzoniere (Song Book) a collection of  366 poems which address his lifelong unrequited love for a mysterious woman named Laura. 

Laura de Noves

In many of these he developed and perfected the sonnet form, and the “Petrarchan sonnet” still bears his name.  Apparently, on 6 April 1327, Good Friday, the sight of a woman called “Laura” in the church of Sainte-Claire d’Avignon awoke in him a lasting passion.  Laura may have been Laura de Noves, the wife of Count Hugues de Sade (an ancestor of the Marquis de Sade).  According to his “Secretum”, she refused him for the very proper reason that she was already married to another man.  Petrarch channeled his feelings into love poems.  Upon her death in 1348, he found that his grief was as difficult to live with as was his former unrequited longing.  Later in his “Letter to Posterity”, Petrarch wrote: “In my younger days I struggled constantly with an overwhelming but pure love affair – my only one, and I would have struggled with it longer had not premature death, bitter but salutary for me, extinguished the cooling flames.  I certainly wish I could say that I have always been entirely free from desires of the flesh, but I would be lying if I did.”  The Romantic composer Franz Liszt set three of Petrarch’s Sonnets (47, 104, and 123) to music for voice, Tre sonetti del Petrarca, which he later would transcribe for solo piano for inclusion in the suite Années de Pèlerinage.

Today is the birthday of Edgar Degas (born Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas, Paris; 19 July 1834 – 27 September 1917 Paris); artist of paintings, sculptures, prints, photographs, and drawings.  He is especially identified with the subject of dance; more than half of his works depict dancers.  He is regarded as one of the founders of Impressionism, although he rejected the term, preferring to be called a realist.  His portraits are notable for their psychological complexity and for their portrayal of human isolation.  At the beginning of his career, Degas wanted to be a history painter, a calling for which he was well prepared by his rigorous academic training and close study of classic art.  In his early thirties, he changed course, and by bringing the traditional methods of a history painter to bear on contemporary subject matter, he became a classical painter of modern life.

Self-portrait (Degas au porte-fusain), 1855

He never married and spent the last years of his life, nearly blind, restlessly wandering the streets of Paris.

Gallery

Il y a amour et on travaille, et nous n’avons qu’un seul cœur.

Of course the song of the day is Liszt’s “Tre sonetti di Petrarca”, I´vidi in terra.  Luciano Pavarotti, tenor.  John Wustman, piano.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bU3E5FjtZh8

All for you muse,

Mac Tag

thanks for stoppin’ by y’all

Only Death can close from my thoughts
the loving path that leads them
to the sweet doorway of their blessing.

– Petrarch

There is always some madness in love, but there is also always some reason in madness. ~ Petrarch

And here choose i; joy be the consequence! – Shakespeare

Whatever it is that pulls the pin, that hurls you past the boundaries of your own life into a brief and total beauty, even for a moment, it is enough. – Jeanette Winterson