More than just ordinary

A long, long time ago, a line from a poem had appeared in a column of a newspaper. My friend A and I swiftly lost our hearts to this line and the article. Then, it was a novel read for us. And although the article was quick to leave my memory, the line occupied a permanent place within because it quickly became a favorite for A, thereby revealing to me a side of a friend I was moved to discover. We were twelve then.

And then last evening, A and I talked after ages, and the joys of tried and tested friendship announced their presence once again. After I ended the conversation with a deep and grateful sigh, I returned to Brida, the book I was reading yesterday, and before me I found that very line, from lifetimes ago. Imagine my surprise, and then to find that it was part of a living, breathing poem. A Yeats poem, no less.

These little coincidences rock my world. Random or divine, my heart rejoices at their generous presence in this one-in-six-billion life and I know only to be grateful. To the forces that be, to her, to the author of that news article (though he omitted to credit Yeats), to Yeats of course, and to the tender love he brings to life in this poem:

He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with the golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams beneath your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams...