"We Are Family"

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in

my heart)i am never without it(anywhere

i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done

by only me is your doing,my darling)

                                                      i fear

no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want

no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)

and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant

and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows

higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)

and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

~ e.e. cummings

I'm ashamed to admit that until just a few minutes ago, I thought e.e. cummings was a woman. My father and sister both majored in English, and my sister is now an English professor, and yet somehow it escaped my attention that e.e. cummings was in fact a man.  Perhaps I had him confused with another poet, one of the female persuasion? Clearly we never studied cummings in any of my high school or college Lit classes. (Another thing I didn't know, he's from Cambridge, Mass. My Dad was from Winchester, which isn't far from Cambridge. New England represent!)

All that aside, I love this poem. It came to my attention when my sister (the aforementioned English professor) suggested I read In Her Shoes by Jennifer Weiner.  In this book, Maggie read cummings' poem at Rose's wedding. And while cummings may have written this poem about a lover, my sister and I view it as a familial bond. That no matter how far apart we are, no matter how long it's been since our last heart to heart conversation, we always carry each other in our hearts.

In fact, prior to ever reading this poem, we developed a saying between us: "Half a heart."  Many years ago, while I was still in my late teens, we came up with that saying. I was living in Virginia at the time, she was here in California. And we'd sign our letters, "Half a heart away" which turned into simply "Half a heart." So when I read this poem, it hit home.  Carrying her heart within my heart... sharing a heart... half of that heart is with her.

In Her Shoes (the movie) was on the other night (starring Cameron Diaz as "Maggie" and Toni Colette as "Rose") and when Maggie read the poem at Rose's wedding, I cried. Now, I cry during a lot of movies (most recently during Home Alone 2 and even during last night's Criminal Minds), but this was different. This was a connection. This was my heart saying, "Yes, cummings got it right."

Even if he was a man.