Poetry Thursday - I Have Loved Hours at Sea by Sara Teasdale

I Have Loved Hours at Sea

I have loved hours at sea, gray cities,
The fragile secret of a flower,
Music, the making of a poem
That gave me heaven for an hour;

First stars above a snowy hill,
Voices of people kindly and wise,
And the great look of love, long hidden,
Found at last in meeting eyes.

I have loved much and been loved deeply --
Oh when my spirit's fire burns low,
Leave me the darkness and the stillness,
I shall be tired and glad to go.

Sara Teasdale (1884-1933)

Born in St Louis, Mississippi, Sara Teasdale was the child of older parents, with teenage siblings, and her first word was "pretty". Throughout her life she was frail and sickly. She was homeschooled and had no playmates of her age till she was ten. The first of many poetry collections was published in 1907. She married in 1914, divorced in 1929, and lived the rest of her life for her poetry. She caught pneumonia in 1933, which weakened her not only in body but in spirit; she committed suicide in New York city that year.