Wednesday, January 18, 2012

'Forever Young'

As the Great War drew to a close, a young Englishwoman wrote wearily in her diary, By the end of 1916, every boy I had ever danced with was dead.


Year: 1895  Unknown Personal Collection of Ron Hunt, Wigan

'Forever Young'

Dance with me, oh will you dance with me?
I’m feeling pretty, let him beg some more,
Here and now, there’s only here and now,
My head is spinning with the ballroom floor,

Dance with me, oh will you dance with me?
Let us not dwell on what we have in store,
Young we are, so very young we are,
There is no war, oh no, there is no war.

Dance with me, oh will you dance with me?
He’s even younger than he looked before,
Young he is, forever young he is
I am still living, and he is no more.


 


Live for the Love of it,
The Happy Amateur

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6 comments:

  1. AnonymousJanuary 18, 2012 at 2:19 PM

    Haunting and lovely. Great photographs as well.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Sasha A. PalmerJanuary 18, 2012 at 2:52 PM

    I'm so glad your comment went through OK! Thank you, Mark. I loved the photographs, too.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Raven's Wing PoetryJanuary 19, 2012 at 11:02 AM

    That's the problem with dying young...it preserves you as you are, but you are trapped in memory as that young person, with no opportunity to create new memories.

    The repetition throughout the three stanzas is what gives it a dance-like feel...and you pull off end-line rhyme rather well too.

    -Nicole

    ReplyDelete
  4. Sasha A. PalmerJanuary 19, 2012 at 11:56 AM

    Thank you, Nicole.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Wayne PitchkoJanuary 19, 2012 at 7:36 PM

    well done...thanks for sharing your words here

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