The
following quotes are from the novel “Lost Light”, Michael Connelly, Little,
Brown, 2003.
Page 3
“There
is no end of things in the heart.
Somebody
once told me that. She said it came from
a poem she believed in. She understood
it to mean that if you took something to heart, really brought it inside those
red velvet folds, then it would always be there for you. No matter what happened, it would be there
waiting. She said this could mean a
person, a place, a dream. A
mission. Anything sacred. She told me that it is all connected in those
secret folds. Always. It is all part of the same and will always be
there, carrying the same beat as your heart.
I am
fifty-two years old and I believe it. At
night when I try to sleep but can’t, that is when I know it. It is when all the pathways seem to connect
and I see the people I have loved and hated and helped and hurt. I see the hands that reach for me. I hear the beat and see and understand what I
must do. I know my mission and I know
there is no turning away or turning back.
And it is in those moments that I know there is no end of things in the
heart.”
Pages
125 - 126
“I’m a
believer in the single-bullet theory.
You can fall in love and make love many times but there is only one
bullet with your name etched on the side.
And if you are lucky enough to be shot with that bullet then the wound
never heals. … What I do know is that
Eleanor Wish had been my bullet. She had
pierced me through and through. There
were other women before and other women since but the wound she left was always
there. It would not heal right. I was still bleeding and I knew I would
always bleed for her. That was just the
way it had to be. There is no end of
things in the heart.”
[This
is a detective novel told in the first person by a retired LA detective named Harry
Bosch. He had married a woman named
Eleanor Wish and it had not worked out.
I sincerely think you should read the novel. Bosch fights to solve a senseless cold case murder
of a young lady; that is one of those things, for him, for which “there is no
end of things in the heart.”
There
are at least 15 novels with Harry Bosch as the protagonist and narrator written
by Connelly and they are all powerful and meaningful reading.
The
poem the woman mentioned to Bosch (I would not leave you hanging on that) was
from the Chinese poems of Li Po, often said to be the greatest poet of
China. The poem was written by him while
in exile around 760 A.D. to an old friend and was translated by an American
poet, Ezra Pound from the notes of the late Ernest Fenollosa and the
decipherings of Professors Mori and Araga.
The pertinent part of the poem is as follows:
‘And
once again we met, later, at the South Bridge head.
And
then the crowd broke up—you went north to San palace.
And if
you ask how I regret that parting?
It is
like the flowers falling at spring’s end,
confused, whirled in a
tangle.
What is
the use of talking! And there is no end of talking—
There
is no end of things in the heart.
I call
in the boy,
Have
him sit on his knees to write and seal this,
And I
send it a thousand miles, thinking.’]
You
must think of all the people who have found a place in your heart or have
placed things there – a dream to make a reality; a place to visit or live;
another person for you to love and care for; a mission in life that you cannot
fail in completing. We do not always set
our own plans, guide our own ship, steer our own course or live the life we
wanted. Life does not work that way.
And you
might have to live your life, if you, too, believe in the single-bullet theory,
without ever feeling that special love that comes from being shot by the person
who has your name etched on their bullet.
Some mornings I am an absolute believer in that theory from my personal
experience and the experiences of many others.
Other days I think that surely there must be more than one person for you
in this huge world and it is just a matter of finding him or her. Still, that is such an impossible task for
any one without Divine help. Is it merely
fate, blind luck or a good guess on the part of two people?
How do
two people discern lust from love? I do
not know the answer to that. However, I
can tell you this: if you are dating, can you imagine lying together in bed,
clothe-less, kissing and kissing, then falling asleep with nothing else
happening? If so, that seems, at least
to me, like a good sign of love. I DO
NOT suggest this as a test, though. Who
knows what the fires of passion will do to your best intentions?
All I
can say is that in the 7th grade at Carr Jr. High School (building
there; new name; new offerings) in the fall semester of 1957 I looked into the
eyes of Drusylla Ann Murray and fell into her soul. There was never a question for me after that
– SHE WAS THE ONE. I was 12-years-old;
she was 11-years-old (turning 12 January 26, 1958.) How could I know? She certainly didn’t. What can an 11-year-old girl offer a 12-year-old
boy at that moment FOR THE REST OF HIS LIFE?
Danged if I knew then or, looking back, now.
A week
or so ago, out of the blue, Drusylla sent me this email. My bullet with her name etched on it must
have wounded her powerfully.
“Thank
you for loving me as you have. You
express yourself in so many ways. I love
you so! – Yours forever, Drusylla”
A
small, terrible, though interesting thought just seared by brain. God forgive me, please. When I was in Vietnam, among the many jobs
the Base Commander found for me to do was to act as a Sniper (many missions). Some of you know that on the worst day of my
life I took the life of an 11-year-old girl who was carrying offensive weapons,
from the distance of a mere two hundred yards: headshot; no pain. It was, forgive me, a “watermelon popper.” That is simply because when you hit a person
in the head it was just like you’d popped a watermelon. I told you that because I thought you should
know some of the truth of war.
I know
she was 11 because just before the shot I heard a still, small voice say, “She
is eleven years old.” The voice did not
sound angry or blameworthy or mad. It
was so very soft and clear and barely loud enough to hear. I sometimes think I may have said it; I am
certain I did not know her age and I did not speak. Of course, my action was right militarily,
though perhaps not religiously or morally - in my eyes.
Or was
it? The positions a war can put you into
and give you 20 seconds to decide your course of action, can leave you forever
wondering if you did the right thing. I
am convinced I did right, although the pain feels the same as if I was wrong. What if the 11-year-old girl had been the
11-year-old Drusylla and it was another Sniper? I cannot begin to contemplate
that.
In his
book about Vietnam, “Steel My Soldiers’ Hearts:” Colonel David Hackworth and
his wife, Eilhys England, Rugged Land; 2003 devotes a whole chapter, Chapter
11, “SNIPER CONTROL CENTER 15 March 1969,” to the snipers of the U.S. Army’s 4th
Battalion, 39th Infantry.
NCO
Larry Tahler, a Sniper, told of a time when, early one morning, he killed six
VC. “I [then] turned my scope on this
one,” Tahler told me [Hackworth] later, “and it was a girl. All I could think was how lovely she
was.” Young and beautiful and packing an
AK-47 – not exactly a Donut Dolly.
Tahler did his job and blew her away.
“I still see her face,” he says.
An
anonymous sniper, at the end of his tour speaks to an NCO, Sergeant Robertson, about
his job.
“I’ve
killed too many people to go home,” the Sniper replied. “I don’t deserve to go home. I’ve got more confirmed kills than I want to
remember, Robby,” the Sniper said. “You
know what I mean?” Robby did.
“As a
Sniper, through my scope,” the Sniper said, “I saw every one of their faces,
usually at the moment of impact. You
don’t know what it’s like to see the shock on their faces or the agony when the
bullet strikes. One minute the guy’s
happy as a Surfer with great waves, not even aware I’m around. The next, he’s dead. And I see every one of them now whenever I
close my eyes. I’m a killer, Robby, and
there’s no place for me in the world.”
“I sat
there in silence,” Robby remembers.
No
power on earth could heal the sniper.”
Thank
you for reading and thinking abut my essay on love and things in the heart. Ponder this over and over. There is much wisdom here. I know.
I am 68 years old and I have experienced so very much.
I still
see her face.
Ralph
B. Strickland, Jr.
Retired
Completely
Disabled in Accordance with The Veterans Administration Rules and Policies
February
2014
God bless
all here.
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