Dedication

The Lanyard

Click the link above to listen to a recording of Billy Collins reading his poem The Lanyard on "A Prairie Home Companion". I first heard this poem one night driving from somewhere to somewhere-else on the snowy roads of upstate New York or New Hampshire -pretty sure it wasn't Vermont. That first recording had none of the audience participation that this recording has. It made the humor more subtle. Hidden in the meaning of the words, not their presentation. Still the recording above is nice. It shows the writer's perspective. Besides, I couldn't find a free recording of the Garrison Keillor version in 90 seconds of searching. If you find it let me know.

In the poem the author remembers giving his mother a useless trinket he made at camp in exchange for the countless hours of labor she selflessly donated to raising him. In the same spirit, I dedicate this webpage to my parents. My parents who never get to see me. Who always want to know what I'm up to, and to "hear the sound of my voice". I know it's just a webpage, it's not time spent at home or telephone calls, but right now it is enough. It's all they've ever asked of me; the best I can do.

The Lanyard - Billy Collins

The other day I was ricocheting slowly
off the blue walls of this room,
moving as if underwater from typewriter to piano,
from bookshelf to an envelope lying on the floor,
when I found myself in the L section of the dictionary
where my eyes fell upon the word lanyard.

No cookie nibbled by a French novelist
could send one into the past more suddenly—
a past where I sat at a workbench at a camp
by a deep Adirondack lake
learning how to braid long thin plastic strips
into a lanyard, a gift for my mother.

I had never seen anyone use a lanyard
or wear one, if that’s what you did with them,
but that did not keep me from crossing
strand over strand again and again
until I had made a boxy
red and white lanyard for my mother.

She gave me life and milk from her breasts,
and I gave her a lanyard.
She nursed me in many a sick room,
lifted spoons of medicine to my lips,
laid cold face-cloths on my forehead,
and then led me out into the airy light

and taught me to walk and swim,
and I, in turn, presented her with a lanyard.
Here are thousands of meals, she said,
and here is clothing and a good education.
And here is your lanyard, I replied,
which I made with a little help from a counselor.

Here is a breathing body and a beating heart,
strong legs, bones and teeth,
and two clear eyes to read the world, she whispered,
and here, I said, is the lanyard I made at camp.
And here, I wish to say to her now,
is a smaller gift—not the worn truth

that you can never repay your mother,
but the rueful admission that when she took
the two-tone lanyard from my hand,
I was as sure as a boy could be
that this useless, worthless thing I wove
out of boredom would be enough to make us even.

So, with that I'll kick off this blog. I'll share things I find interesting or special. Sometimes it won't be a mushy dedication to my parents. Sometimes it will be interesting, sometimes funny (I hope), sometimes serious.