How do I love thee?
Let me count the ways...
I love you to the heavens and planets and stars
my soul can reach, though they be out of sight
for the ends of the sky and everlasting grace.
I love you to the level of everyday's
most deafening want, by sun and candlelight.
I love you freely,
as women seek Equality.
I love you purely,
as they turn from Normality.
I love you with an unused passion,
with my past, and with my ever-aging soul.
I love you with a love that I believed I had given away --
I love you with every smile, laugh, tear... all of my life! --
And if God willing,
I will love you until the last breath is drawn from my mouth.
"Let Me Count The Ways" by Yoko Ono was the inspiration for this rewrite :)
the original by Elizabeth Barrett Browning has a slight rhyme and meter, but I threw both out of the window...
http://www3.amherst.edu/~rjyanco94/literature/elizabethbarrettbrowning/poems/sonnetsfromtheportuguese/howdoilovetheeletmecounttheways.html
**
Leigh