I am still think about El Lawrence today. A truly remarkable day! A day when, out of a clear blue sky, my oldest and dearest friend reappeared after decades gone missing, during which I could not even be sure she was still alive. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The other day, in my first post about Lawrence, I forgot to mention the poem that appears on the first page of his auto-biography, Seven Pillars of Wisdom<\/a>. Wikipedia describes this poem with these words:<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Speculation surrounds the book’s dedication, a poem written by Lawrence and edited by Robert Graves, concerning whether it is to an individual or to the whole Arab race. It begins, “To S.A.”, possibly meaning Selim Ahmed, a young Arab boy from Syria of whom Lawrence was very fond. Ahmed died, probably from typhus, aged 19, a few weeks before the offensive to liberate Damascus. Lawrence received the news of his death some days before he entered Damascus.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Though understated, the love Lawrence had for Selim is clearly evident in the move Lawrence of Arabia. In the poem, it is more touching. Here is a link to a PDF copy of the Seven Pillars of Wisdom<\/strong><\/a>, which is now in the public domain. I reproduce the poem below.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Dedication To S.A. Today, when I am so vividly reminded of what friendship can mean in a persons life, these words touch my heartstrings like a song.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I am still think about El Lawrence today. A truly remarkable day! A day when, out of a clear blue sky, my oldest and dearest friend reappeared after decades gone missing, during which I could not even be sure she was still alive. The other day, in my first post about Lawrence, I forgot to … Continue reading At Home in the Desert: Lawrence of Arabia and Me.<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-262","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.relentlesscompassion.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/262","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.relentlesscompassion.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.relentlesscompassion.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.relentlesscompassion.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.relentlesscompassion.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=262"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.relentlesscompassion.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/262\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":263,"href":"http:\/\/www.relentlesscompassion.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/262\/revisions\/263"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.relentlesscompassion.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.relentlesscompassion.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.relentlesscompassion.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
I loved you, so I drew these tides of men into my hands
and wrote my will across the sky in stars
To earn you Freedom, the seven-pillared worthy house,
that your eyes might be shining for me
When we came.
Death seemed my servant on the road, till we were near
and saw you waiting:
When you smiled, and in sorrowful envy he outran me
and took you apart:
Into his quietness.
Love, the way-weary, groped to your body, our brief wage
ours for the moment
Before earth\u2019s soft hand explored your shape, and the blind
worms grew fat upon
Your substance.
Men prayed me that I set our work, the inviolate house,
as a memory of you.
But for fit monument I shattered it, unfinished: and now
The little things creep out to patch themselves hovels
in the marred shadow
Of your gift<\/p>\n\n\n\n