Ophelia

Painting in Oil. John Everett Millais's masterpiece, "Ophelia," completed between 1851 and 1852. 

​Ophelia

When I was just a teenager, our front door was flanked by beautiful Daphne plants. Every time I walked through that door I was enthralled by the scent, the sweet scent of the flowers. At one point I even tried to pick the flowers and make perfume out of the oil, but unfortunately someone took off the lid off my pot and the fragrance was immediately absorbed into the air of the kitchen.


Much later, when I went away to college at the University of Oregon,  the campus was abundant with the plants of that beautiful shrub and the air redolent with its scent. I would wander across the grounds in the evening with that fragrance in my nostrils and dream and dream and dream… perhaps of a someday romance—although I knew not how to envision such a thing. It really consumed me. 


I loved Shakespeare. I loved my professor Dr. Moll. He was a poet laureate. A gentle older man, he delivered all of his lessons so beautifully, so well that no one could help but love Shakespeare, if there are such people who couldn’t adore Shakespeare. I was especially attached to Hamlet and in particular Ophelia. I felt like she was a part of me, someone I could really feel for. Abandoned by the men she loved and trusted, and feeling powerless to go on alone. Because of that affection for Ophelia and the scent of Daphne I have made this little poem:


Ophelia


Marble face,  
cheeks of roses
golden tresses  
stream amid reeds.


No power to divert 
currents of rage
pure love is transformed
and by disgust consumed.


Youth discarded
In clouds of treason
where evil dwells 
love stands no chance


Adieu Ophelia, 
neither father, nor brother,
nor lover
will save you.