Love is a Mystery. In more ways than one...

Roy Croft seems to be an enigma. No one knows who he is (or was). Yet his poem, Love, shared with you today in honor of Valentine's Day, has been used in innumerable wedding and commitment ceremonies. Maybe if we continue to share the poem, someone will be able to solve the mystery.

When asked about it, researcher Ted Nesbitt wrote in one website that he found a collection of Croft's poems published by Blue Mountain Press in the late 1970s. Some of you may recall Blue Mountain for it's pretty - but schmaltzy -cards and chap books. It started as a vanity press which meant Croft might have paid to have his booklet published. I found his poem, however, in a collection I own that is copyrighted 1936: The Best Loved Poems of the American People selected by Hazel Felleman.

Felleman acknowledges permissions from various poets and publishing houses for the verses she selected but not, (guess who?) Roy Croft, mystery poet. So, was Croft's poem written long before that? Was it already in the public domain as of 1936? I hope someone knows the answer. While we wait, here's the poem:

LOVE

I love you,

Note only for what you are,

But for what I am

When I am with you.

I love you ,

Not only for what

You have made of yourself,

But for what

You are making of me.

I love you

For the part of me

That you bring out;

I love you

For putting your hand

Into my heaped-up heart

And passing over

All the foolish, weak thngs

That you can't help

Dimly seeing there,

And for drawing out

Into the light

All the beautiful belongings

That no one else had looked

Quite far enough to find.

I love you because you

Are helping me to make

Of the lumber of my life

Not a tavern

But a temple;

Out of the works

Of my every day

Not a reproach

But a song.

I love you

Because you have done

More than any creed

Could have done

To make me good,

And more than any fate

Could have done

To make me happy.

You have done it

Without a touch,

Without a word,

Withoug a sign.

You have done it

By being yourself.

Perhaps that is what

Being a friend means,

After all.

Roy Croft

Happy Valentine's Day, everyone! I wish you all that kind of love.

Mur

This week, Poetry Friday is hosted by: I'm Here. I'm Queer. What the Hell do I Read? http://www.leewind.org/