The Shinning Love

THE SHINING LOVE

     While waiting for a friend the other day, I stepped into the park and rested on one of the benches, luxuriating in the pleasurable warmth, the fall sunshine, the scattering of vari-colored leaves and the fragrance of woodsmoke drifting with the morning breezes.

     A young woman caught my eye and in a little while I noticed that she was not alone.  She had a young man with her, and one in whom she saw the beginning and the end of all creation.   It was so obvious that they were in love, that for a while I almost felt a flush of embarrassment for them.

     She would gaze into his eyes, smile and make little chirping noises while he rolled his head from side to side in the pleasure of her caress.  Cheek to cheek they sat with her whispering little, lilting phrases and caressing his strong, young body.  He, his attention flitting for a moment, turned his head to watch a small dog trotting along the path.

     But this momentary coolness to her passionate caresses did nothing to weaken her ardor.  She simply pressed him closer to her breast and winding her arms tightly around his shoulders crushed him to her in an even more passionate embrace.  Finally answering her love with renewed interest he again amused himself by taking handfuls of her hair and tossing it into the breeze until the long silky strands were rumpled in wild abandon.

     Finally, unable to withstand the desire for his kiss, she threw caution and public opinion to the winds and locked her lips on his for a long moment of rapturous bliss.

     After at long last they left the park, awakened to the passage of time – making their departure through the whirling gates – I thought of their great and undying romance.

     Yes sir!  I never saw a mother love a three-month old son more that that woman did.

*      *     *     *     *

     It was a long time ago now, perhaps sometime this spring when I was walking in the park – that it happened.  An old woman, bent and grey, was making her tired and feeble way down the path.  Peering this way and that, she was obviously fretting that there was something she sought to find – and couldn’t.

     I watched her hobble on her way, the bare feet plastered with mud from the streets making no sound upon the graveled walks.  Wondering and mildly curious, I decided to follow her.

     Together, we made our way through most of the park while she continued her search.  As the possibilities of finding what she was seeking grew less, the more agitated she became.  Once or twice she paused to wipe her eyes, dragging a ragged sleeve across her face.

     Finally, she halted.  Her body tensed, she approached a ragged figure sprawled on the grass behind the shrubs.  It was a park drunk, dirty and ill fed, unkempt and to even the unpracticed eye well on the way to complete physical and moral dissolution.

     But she knelt beside him and wiped his face – this filthy hulk of manhood, and urged him to stand erect.  He groaned in drunken sleep, tossed his arms and finally came awake.  Averting his face from her gaze he made a clumsy attempt to stand.  With her arm around his waist he braced faltering steps – all the while leaning upon her tired shoulder.  And so they made their way from the park; she mildly scolding and he, shamefaced, answering her complaints with a simple, “Yes, ma.  Sure, ma!  I know I shouldn’t drink so much.”

     So it is!  Whether three months or thirty years – the mother love, that shining love, never really fades away.

     Wonderful, isn’t it? 

COPYRIGHT 1955  BY JOE BROOKS

Reprinted with permission

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This article and others previously posted on this Blog were originally published by Joe Brooks in the early 1950's when Joe resided in Taipei.

Who is Joe Brooks?  Find out - HERE