Diary of a love affair, from Europe to California (a la "Doctor Zhivago").
Love poems.
Once in a lifetime, there may come a love you can neither deny nor ever forget.
13 January
You are into me
like flame and fire
as no other desire could
know such gentle fury
… like an undefined thirst
incalculably uncontrolled,
or passion spent in seeking
a wild
and wondrous rose.
* * *
With love, as in life, there are no guarantees. Except always a beginning, always an end. Nothing else is certain, set in stone. The thoughts and emotions that drive us indeed ever churning, changing...
ever in flux, ebb and flow.
So too, the heart—yet once fixed, as relentless as a star: the blaze too brilliant to be near, consuming all. Whether right or wrong, a force of such power and import, almost impossible to stop. Impossible not to desire above all things (whether prudent or unwise)... moving us to destiny or despair.
May your star remain fixed—your love, the life it was meant to be.
* * *
Originally published in 2008, completely revised March 2012 ,(mostly just the interior layout, and back cover text). You, My Love was a winning finalist in the Nat'l Indie Excellence Awards, 2010; and the runner-up in both the London Book Festival, 2011, and Paris Book Festival, 2012.
(Available on Amazon -- best found by typing in my author's name first, then all the books show up.)
Excerpt
30 March 1966
Sembach, Germany
It's uncannily good
how wonderful your voice
can start the day,
even if it's half lost
and buried in a tangle of wires
on a telephone...
with the sun out first thing
and the sky clear-blue and cold
... spring late and lazy
coming through the still wintery
end of March:
your words
become the soft of morning's promise,
the warmth and hope of many summers
yet to be...
interplayed
between the sound, the day...
the long and lonely distance bridged.
Professional Reviews
5.0 out of 5 starsA Timeless Journey By Terrianne Tallman on July 21, 2009 Format: Paperback Angela Saunders, Poetry editor at BellaOnline, writes; I absolutely fell in love with Atwood's book.
"You, My Love" is broken into two books, a start of a fiery love
story and the end of the journey (but not of the love). Rather than
simply being a compilation of poems written for a love, each poem is a
piece of a story that builds upon itself in a steady crescendo that
begins with a glimpse, climaxes into a full blown passion, and then
drops the reader into the building agony of a secret love that can
never come to fruition. It tells the story of an accidental love that
was forced apart by time and torn asunder by distance. Like a tidal
wave, the emotions poured out into the verses left me pulled me under
and left me gasping for more.
After reading this, I was left with a single question- How many of us
would give anything to be loved and adored in the fashion that was
poured out in this diary? I was completely captivated by this timeless
classic and am looking forward to reading more poetry from Atwood.
5.0 out of 5 starsThe best book I've ever read By lb on March 28, 2013
This diary is of a modern day Paolo and Francesca who instead of being eternally damned in Dante's Inferno are damned by living. The heaviness of this work is explosive, not even the slightest sigh is light. Atwood grants the reader an insight into the kaleidoscope of emotion he felt that comes with the most intense of loves.
Richard Atwood strips all pretenses of love and prostrates himself onto the page in such raw fashion that the reader is forever affected. For some reason he is granted a moments glimpse into the heavenly realms and falls in love with a goddess eternally scarring his soul. Such intense passion collided with pain so much so that the equilibrium of nature suffered. Whether this is a love story or a cursed tragedy or both is up for the reader to decide.
"Even the wind screams of such injustice."
There is no comparing this to other masterpieces, this stands alone.
force and unpredictability of love. I was touched beyond words with the collection ... ByGeetha Patelon July 5, 2014
"You, My Love" is a true testament to the beauty, force and unpredictability of love. I was touched beyond words with the collection of these eloquent poems written with pure passion and great class. Mr. Atwood has the ability to reach and touch the hearts of the readers through his written words.
The story is about forbidden love; a love that creeps into two human beings as an innocent dove and ignites such a flame into them, that it becomes impossible to resist. The poet, his lover and love become one in his poems. As Shakespeare rightly said, "All is fair in love and war."
The lovers meet in their own field.
"Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and right doing, there is a field. I'll meet you there" Jalaluddin Rumi - 13th century
I loved every poem in the book and was completely lost in them. It is a must read!
YOU, MY LOVE was a winning Finalist in the Poetry category for the 2010 National Indie Excellence Awards... honoring small presses and self-published authors. (There was just one overall "Winner," and six Finalists.)
