Panegyric

This poem was written around Valentine’s day 2007, about three months into my relationship with the young lady who would eventually consent to marry me and be my life partner. It was originally titled ‘Your face — to Aijan’.

Would these yellow turns of time
reveal an arabesque in rhyme
that would chime the joy and pleasure
of your young unblemished face

Then the greatest poets should
to show they understood
Burn their works of passion
in a humble rite of faith

From the hallowed ashes could
then paper be produced
On which the single greatest poet
the ardent lines would trace

And to their almost saintly measure
of admiration for this treasure
they would read each other ever
of the verses that were placed

For there could no poetry be greater
nor be written later
then the sonnet that retells
the joy and beauty of your face.

• Paul Kunneman, February 2007

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