The Christmas Wreath

By Anna de Brémont

Oh! Christmas wreath upon the wall,
Within thine ivied space
I see the years beyond recall,
Amid thy leaves I trace
The shadows of a happy past,
When all the world was bright,
And love its magic splendour cast
O’er morn and noon and night.

Oh! Christmas wreath upon the wall,
’Neath memory’s tender spell
A wondrous charm doth o’er thee fall,
And round thy beauty dwell.
Thine ivy hath the satiny sheen
Of tresses I’ve caressed,
Thy holly’s crimson gleam I’ve seen
On lips I oft have pressed.

Oh! Christmas wreath upon the wall,
A mist steals o’er my sight.
Dear hallow’d wreath, these tears are all
The pledge I now can plight
To those loved ones whose spirit eyes
Shine down the flight of time;
Around God’s throne their voices rise
To swell the Christmas Chime!

About the Poem

There is something quietly powerful about a Christmas wreath. We hang it almost without thinking—on a door, above a mantel, in a hallway we pass through every day. And yet, as Anna de Brémont reminds us, the wreath becomes far more than decoration. It becomes a frame for memory.

For many LGBTQ+ people, Christmas is a season layered with complexity. It holds beauty and warmth, but also silence—loves once hidden, names never spoken aloud, affections carefully guarded. Some of our most meaningful relationships lived in the margins of what was considered acceptable, even as they shaped us deeply and truthfully.

The wreath in this poem holds those memories without judgment. Its ivy and holly recall touch and intimacy—hair once caressed, lips once kissed—loves that were real, even if they could not always be visible. De Brémont does not apologize for this remembering. She sanctifies it.

As the poem moves toward its close, grief and hope meet. Those we loved, and sometimes lost too soon or too quietly, are not erased. Their presence is gathered into something eternal. Their voices, the poem tells us, now rise in the Christmas chime around God’s throne.

For those of us who have ever wondered whether our love was too much, too different, or too inconvenient to be holy, this poem offers a quiet reassurance: love remembered with tenderness is never wasted. It endures. It is held. It belongs.

This Christmas, may the wreaths we hang remind us not only of tradition, but of truth—that love, in all its forms, is worthy of remembrance, and that nothing genuine is ever outside the reach of grace.

In “The Christmas Wreath,” Anna de Brémont transforms a familiar holiday symbol into a vessel of remembrance. The evergreen wreath—traditionally a sign of eternal life—becomes a mirror through which the speaker revisits love, intimacy, and loss.

The ivy and holly are not merely decorative. They take on human qualities:

• ivy becomes the “satiny sheen / Of tresses I’ve caressed”
• holly recalls the “crimson gleam” of beloved lips

This is a deeply embodied poem. Memory is tactile. Love is remembered through touch, color, and physical closeness.

In the final stanza, the poem shifts heavenward. The wreath no longer holds only memory—it becomes a bridge between worlds. The speaker’s tears are not despairing, but devotional, offered as a sacred pledge to loved ones whose voices now join the “Christmas Chime” around God’s throne.

The poem does not deny grief; it sanctifies it.

About the Poet

Anna de Brémont (1859–1922) was an American poet, novelist, and playwright whose work often explored themes of love, longing, memory, and emotional interiority. Writing at the turn of the 20th century, she was part of a literary moment that valued lyricism and personal reflection—especially in poetry intended for quiet reading rather than public performance.

While not widely read today, de Brémont’s poetry resonates with modern readers for its emotional clarity and its willingness to hold tenderness and sorrow in the same breath. Her Christmas poetry, in particular, avoids sentimentality, instead offering a mature meditation on love that endures beyond time.

*          *          *

Perhaps that is why we hang wreaths year after year. Not just to celebrate the season—but to remember. To honor love that shaped us. To trust that nothing truly cherished is ever lost.May this season hold space for both your joy and your longing. Both belong.

Mistletoe
By Walter de la Mare

Sitting under the mistletoe
(Pale-green, fairy mistletoe),
One last candle burning low,
All the sleepy dancers gone,
Just one candle burning on,
Shadows lurking everywhere:
Some one came, and kissed me there.

Tired I was; my head would go
Nodding under the mistletoe
(Pale-green, fairy mistletoe),
No footsteps came, no voice, but only,
Just as I sat there, sleepy, lonely,
Stooped in the still and shadowy air
Lips unseen—and kissed me there.

I was thinking the other day about kissing—it came up in a discussion—and it made me wonder: when was the last time I was kissed passionately or romantically? Really kissed. And the truth is… I couldn’t remember. Men I’ve dated often don’t want to kiss, or there’s a “no kissing on the first date” rule. So yes, it’s been a while. And I miss it. I’ve always loved kissing. It was actually kissing the last girlfriend I ever dated that made me realize I no longer wanted to try dating women. The kiss wasn’t bad—it was fine—but I remember thinking that I’d rather be her, the one kissed, held, and cherished. That desire to be held and loved, to feel that deep sense of comfort and safety, was the first real shift in how I understood my sexuality.

Anyway, I’m already off topic. This morning was bitterly cold (it was –8° last night and still –1° when I got up), and as I searched for a poem that felt right for December—something that carried the hush of the season—I returned to Walter de la Mare’s “Mistletoe.” I’ve used this poem in the past, but it hits differently every time I read it.

About the Poem

“Mistletoe” is a winter whisper of longing, enchantment, and loneliness. De la Mare captures that in-between moment at the end of a party—when the music has stopped, the candles have burned low, and someone remains behind in the soft afterglow. It’s a scene suspended between waking and dreaming. Out of that stillness comes a kiss, quiet and unannounced, arriving like magic or memory or hope.

The kiss is tender, mysterious, and possibly imagined. That ambiguity is the poem’s heartbeat:

Is the kiss real, or is it the dream of someone wishing desperately to be kissed?

From a queer perspective, the poem resonates even more. Many LGBTQ+ people know what it means to sit on the margins of gatherings, to feel both present and unseen. Many of us have spent years longing for a kiss we didn’t yet have permission to want—or couldn’t openly ask for. The poem’s “lips unseen” carry the suggestion of a secret desire, a hidden affection, or the longing for intimacy that might not be safe to show in public.

The mistletoe itself—a plant associated with holiday traditions, romantic possibility, and the chance of a spontaneous kiss—becomes a symbol of queer yearning. It represents the hope that love might find us unexpectedly, even quietly, even when we feel most alone.

Reading it today, what struck me most was the tenderness of an unseen kiss offered to someone tired, lonely, half-asleep. It feels like a blessing of comfort. A reminder that desire doesn’t disappear simply because time has passed. A reminder that even in the coldest season, warmth can find us.

And maybe, for some of us, a reminder that we still long to be kissed—and that it’s okay to say so.

About the Poet

Walter de la Mare (1873–1956) was an English poet, novelist, and writer of children’s literature, best known for his atmospheric, dreamlike style. His work often explores the boundary between the real and the uncanny, weaving together memory, imagination, and the subtle tensions of solitude. De la Mare’s poetry is marked by musical phrasing and delicate imagery, and he remains beloved for pieces like “The Listeners” and his numerous anthology favorites. Though he lived a largely private life, his work continues to resonate with anyone drawn to mystery, introspection, and the quiet emotional spaces we tend to visit in winter.

If Time Would Let Us
By Theresa Williams Hudson

I wish we could wake
each morning forever—
the soft light on your face,
your breath beside mine,
the world still quiet,
just us.

But time is a thief
with gentle hands,
unfolding the hours
like pages we didn’t mean to turn.

I watch you in moments—
your laugh,
the way your eyes still find mine
in a crowded room,
the way your hand finds mine
in the dark.

And I think—
what if this is all we get?

What if this love,
this life,
was always a flame meant to flicker
just long enough
to change everything it touched?

Time is slowing.
Time is ending.
And still, I’d choose you
in every hour we’re given.

Even in the leaving,
you’re worth the ache.
Even in the silence,
you echo.

If time would let us,
I’d never let you go.
But if it must,
then let me love you
so fiercely
you feel me
even in the quiet after.

About the Poem

This past Saturday, November 29, marked ten years since I lost a dear friend in a car accident. He and I met through this blog. What began as comments and emails grew into an everyday friendship—we texted constantly, starting each morning with a “good morning” and ending each night with “I love you.”

We never got the chance to meet in person, though we had planned to. My next academic conference was going to bring me to his city, and we were both excited to finally see each other face to face. Until then, our friendship lived in words—words that carried us through laughter, struggles, and the simple comfort of daily check-ins.

His life had been unbearably difficult. When he came out, his family disowned him. The boyfriend who had inspired him to come out abandoned him when he needed love most. He suffered night terrors almost every evening, haunted by the cruel voices planted in him by those who should have cared for him. And yet, he was one of the sweetest souls I’ve ever known. He loved browsing the greeting card aisle, picking out cards that reminded him of friends, and sending them just because. I still have many of those cards and treasure them. He even sent cards to his family, though they always came back unopened—sometimes with hateful notes scrawled across them.

But in the months before his death, things were finally turning around. He had a boyfriend who loved him deeply, a man who planned to propose to him on Christmas morning. He had a good job, was preparing to move back near his partner, and was about to begin graduate school. For the first time in a long time, his life was on the verge of stability, love, and happiness. And then, tragedy took him away.

Though he was in my life for only a short time, his influence was profound. He gave me strength and courage when I needed it most. Once, when I was nervous about meeting someone I’d connected with online, he encouraged me to take the chance. I did, and that leap became a lasting relationship with a man who was not only a boyfriend, but also a fellow scholar and Episcopal priest, someone I could talk to about both history and faith. That never would have happened without my friend urging me to step out of my comfort zone.

After his death, I couldn’t even say his name without bursting into tears. For years, grief made his memory almost too heavy to bear. Yet time, though it took him from me, also left behind echoes—his laughter, his words of encouragement, his insistence that life is meant to be embraced. Today, I keep a framed picture of him in my living room. When I hesitate at the edge of change, I look at that picture, and I can almost hear him telling me again: take the chance.

Theresa Williams Hudson’s poem captures the ache of this anniversary perfectly. “But time is a thief with gentle hands, unfolding the hours like pages we didn’t mean to turn.” That’s how it felt—like the story of his life was moving toward hope, only to have the pages snatched away before he could finish the chapter. Her words—“what if this love, this life, was always a flame meant to flicker just long enough to change everything it touched?”—remind me that though his flame was short, it changed me forever.

Hudson ends with: “Even in the leaving, you’re worth the ache. Even in the silence, you echo.” That is exactly how I remember my friend. Even ten years later, he is worth every ache of grief. And even in the silence of his absence, he still echoes in my life—in kindness, in courage, and in love. He is the one who encouraged me to take the risk of applying for the job in Vermont, the one decision that reshaped my life and brought me here. Every time I step into a new chapter, I carry his voice with me. If time would have let us, I would never have let him go. Since it didn’t, I live more fully because of him.

About the Poet

Theresa Williams Hudson is a contemporary poet whose work often explores love, loss, and the passing of time. Writing in free verse, she draws on intimate moments and everyday images to capture emotions that feel both deeply personal and universally resonant. Her poetry has circulated widely online, where its honesty and tenderness have found a devoted readership. “If Time Would Let Us” exemplifies her ability to distill profound truths into lyrical simplicity, reminding us that even the most fleeting connections can echo long after time has moved on.

Thanksgiving
By James Whitcomb Riley

Let us be thankful—not only because
   Since last our universal thanks were told
We have grown greater in the world’s applause,
   And fortune’s newer smiles surpass the old—
But thankful for all things that come as alms
   From out the open hand of Providence:—
The winter clouds and storms—the summer calms—
   The sleepless dread—the drowse of indolence.
Let us be thankful—thankful for the prayers
   Whose gracious answers were long, long delayed,
That they might fall upon us unawares,
   And bless us, as in greater need we prayed.
Let us be thankful for the loyal hand
   That love held out in welcome to our own,
When love and only love could understand
   The need of touches we had never known.
Let us be thankful for the longing eyes
   That gave their secret to us as they wept,
Yet in return found, with a sweet surprise,
   Love’s touch upon their lids, and, smiling, slept.
And let us, too, be thankful that the tears
   Of sorrow have not all been drained away,
That through them still, for all the coming years,
   We may look on the dead face of To-day.

About the Poem

As we move into Thanksgiving week—a short one for many of us, and hopefully a peaceful one—it feels right to slow down, take a breath, and sit with a poem that understands the holiday not as perfection, but as presence. James Whitcomb Riley’s “Thanksgiving” is simple on its surface, yet gently profound in its reminder that gratitude often lives quietly in the ordinary spaces of our lives.

Riley is sometimes called the “Hoosier Poet,” known for his nostalgic portrayals of Midwestern life. But “Thanksgiving” reaches far beyond its setting. The poem invites us to be grateful not just for success or blessings that shine, but also for the quieter graces—calm days, sufficient bread, moments of peace in a noisy world.

It’s a gentle reminder that gratitude doesn’t only come wrapped in celebration. Sometimes it comes in small mercies: time off before a holiday, a quiet office, or even the chance to sit with memories of those we’ve loved and lost. For many LGBTQ+ people, Thanksgiving can be complicated, but Riley’s poem offers a form of gratitude that doesn’t require perfection—just awareness.

This week, many of us juggle traditions, emotions, travel, absence, and the bittersweet ache of remembering those who won’t sit at the table with us anymore. Gratitude can be tender, even painful. And yet, as Riley writes, we “are richer than we know,” not because everything is easy, but because blessings—large and small—still find their way into our days.

For LGBTQ+ folks especially, finding spaces where we can breathe, belong, or simply rest is a blessing worth naming.

As we enter this holiday week, may we find gratitude in whatever form it takes—joyful, quiet, complicated, or tender. May we honor the memories that still ache, the friends who steady us, the moments of peace that carry us through. And may we remember that grace often hides in the ordinary.

Wishing everyone a gentle and meaningful Thanksgiving week.

About the Poet

James Whitcomb Riley (1849–1916) was one of America’s most beloved popular poets. Sometimes sentimental, often nostalgic, he captured a vision of everyday American life rooted in kindness, simplicity, and warmth. His work was widely read in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, often recited at gatherings and printed in holiday editions of newspapers and magazines. “Thanksgiving” reflects the accessible, heartfelt tone for which he was known.

Spring Rush

By Aaron Smith

The college boys have pulled their shirts
off and are playing football
on the lawn. Their farmer tans pink
in the afternoon sun. They toss

and jog, slight fake and almost
tackle. One puts his face too close
to another one’s stomach, grabs
the guy’s waist—steady—to keep

from falling; then a damp armpit on the back
of his neck, as a blond wraps his arm
around him in a quick guy-hug. I am old-
er and pretend not to see, furtive

in sunglasses, looking at them, past
them, at them. I could ruin the game
by watching the wrong way—professor gawking
at students; even a shift between them

could change everything: a hand more than
smacking an ass, someone pressed too long
against a humid chest. Crash of skin,
body pushing body into perfect crush.

Their biceps bulge, un-bulge, bulge again.
It’s not that I want them. I’ve had enough
men, and yet I can’t stop looking at them
while trying not to look at them.

About the Poem

Aaron Smith has a way of holding up a moment—one we might otherwise dismiss as simple, ordinary, harmless—and revealing all the longing, all the humor, all the complicated ache underneath. His poem “Spring Rush” captures a scene many of us know all too well: young men tumbling across a sunlit lawn, roughhousing with the kind of careless intimacy that adulthood slowly chisels away.

The poem opens with a tableau of shirtless college boys playing football, their “farmer tans pink in the afternoon sun,” their bodies moving with effortless confidence. It’s a familiar choreography to anyone who has watched young men at play—how easily they invade each other’s space, how unselfconscious their closeness is, how they grab, steady, press, and laugh without a second thought. Smith catches each gesture with almost photographic clarity:

one puts his face too close
to another one’s stomach…
a blond wraps his arm
around him in a quick guy-hug.

What he’s really capturing, though, is the speaker watching. Not intrusively, not predatory, but with a mix of wistfulness and restraint—half nostalgia, half desire, and a healthy dose of gay self-awareness. “I am older and pretend not to see,” he admits, slipping on the protection of sunglasses, watching but trying not to watch. Smith renders the tension of that gaze with startling honesty. He knows how easily a moment like this can break, how a look held too long can change the boys’ play, turning innocent roughhousing into something self-conscious, something policed.

It’s the familiar queer balancing act: seeing without being seen seeing.

One of the most poignant lines comes near the end:

It’s not that I want them. I’ve had enough
men, and yet I can’t stop looking at them
while trying not to look at them.

It’s a line that resonates with age, experience, and the complicated beauty of queer desire. Wanting isn’t always erotic; sometimes it’s longing for a kind of ease, a kind of freedom, a kind of uncomplicated belonging that many of us never got to fully inhabit in our younger years. The poem complicates the gaze—it’s not a hunger for the boys, but a hunger for the days when closeness wasn’t dangerous.

Spring Rush is tender, observant, and unflinchingly honest. It holds space for that bittersweet place where desire, memory, and self-restraint overlap—where we both relish and mourn the distance between who we were and who we have become.

About the Poet

Aaron Smith is an award-winning American poet known for his candid, queer-centered writing that blends desire, humor, vulnerability, and sharp cultural observation. A graduate of the MFA program at the University of Pittsburgh, he is the author of several acclaimed collections, including Blue on Blue Ground, Appetite, and Primer. Smith’s work often explores gay identity, aging, pop culture, and the messy intersections of intimacy and longing. His poems have appeared in Ploughshares, The Yale Review, Court Green, and Best American Poetry.

The Raven (excerpt)
by Edgar Allan Poe

(For the full poem, click read more below.)

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,

Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore—

While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,

As of someone gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.

“’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door—

Only this and nothing more.”

“Once Upon a Midnight Dreary”

There’s no poem more synonymous with Halloween than Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven.” Even if you’ve never read the whole thing, you probably know the rhythm of its most famous lines:

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary…

It’s a poem that practically sounds haunted. Poe’s mastery of meter—specifically trochaic octameter—creates that heartbeat of dread, the steady pulse of something inevitable drawing closer. It’s hypnotic, musical, and just a little bit claustrophobic, which is exactly what makes it unforgettable.

First published in 1845, “The Raven” cemented Poe’s reputation as a master of the macabre. It’s a simple enough story: a grieving man, alone at night, haunted by memories of his lost love Lenore, and visited by a mysterious talking raven whose only word is “Nevermore.” But that single refrain becomes a psychological echo chamber. The poem isn’t just about a bird—it’s about despair, loss, and the way grief has of turning every question we ask into the same hopeless answer.

The imagery is classic Gothic: midnight shadows, rustling curtains, lamplight, and a chamber filled with memory. The bird itself feels almost supernatural, perched high above the door like a prophet of doom—or perhaps the physical embodiment of the narrator’s own unraveling mind.

So why has “The Raven” endured for nearly two centuries as the quintessential spooky poem? Because it captures the feeling that true horror doesn’t come from monsters or ghosts—it comes from our own thoughts in the dark. The fear that we’ll never escape our sorrow. The whisper that maybe hope really is gone forever.

And yet, there’s a strange beauty in it too. Poe’s language is lush and musical, the kind of poetry that demands to be read aloud by candlelight on a chilly October night. Every “tapping,” every “Nevermore,” pulls us deeper into the darkness until we almost welcome it.

The Voice of Vincent Price

For me—and I suspect for many others—the poem truly comes alive through Vincent Price’s iconic reading. That smooth, sinister voice, tinged with both elegance and dread, feels as though it was made for Poe’s words. Price doesn’t just recite the poem; he inhabits it. Every syllable trembles with tension and theatrical flair. You can hear the madness building, the grief curdling into obsession, until that final “Nevermore” echoes like a spell being cast.

It’s impossible for me to read “The Raven” without hearing Price’s voice in my mind—a voice that turns the poem from literature into pure atmosphere. His performance reminds us that Halloween isn’t only about visuals; it’s about sound—the creak of the floorboard, the rustle of wings, the trembling cadence of a haunted heart.

Maybe that’s why, year after year, we return to “The Raven.” It reminds us that Halloween isn’t just about fright—it’s about fascination. The allure of the unknown. The comfort of knowing that even in our deepest gloom, someone else—perhaps Poe himself—has been there before.

And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor

Shall be lifted—nevermore.

Happy Halloween, everyone—and if you’ve never listened to Vincent Price read “The Raven,” treat yourself. There’s no better way to spend an October night.

About the Poet

Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1849) was an American writer, poet, editor, and literary critic best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre. Born in Boston and orphaned at a young age, Poe led a turbulent life marked by poverty, loss, and artistic brilliance. He is often credited with pioneering the modern detective story, influencing early science fiction, and perfecting the Gothic short story. His poems—especially “The Raven” and “Annabel Lee”—combine musical rhythm with haunting emotion, exploring love, death, and madness. Though he died at only forty, Poe’s legacy continues to cast a long and ghostly shadow over American literature—and Halloween wouldn’t be the same without him.

Now and Then

By Charles Bertram Johnson

“All life is built from song”
In youth’s young morn I sang;
And from a top-near hill
The echo broke and rang.

The years with pinions swift
To youth’s high noon made flight,
“All life is built from song”
I sang amid the fight.

To life’s sun-setting years,
My feet have come—Alas!
And through its hopes and fears
Again I shall not pass.

The lusty song my youth
With high-heart ardor sang
Is but a tinkling sound—
A cymbal’s empty clang.

And now I sing, my Dear,
With wisdom’s wiser heart,
“All life is built from love,
And song is but a part.”

About the Poem

When did you first realize that you had gotten older?

For me, it happened when I received an email from a young Marine. He addressed me as Sir and kept referring to me as Mr. ________. I know he was only being polite—showing respect as Marines are trained to do—but it stopped me in my tracks. That single word, Sir, carried a weight I hadn’t quite felt before. It wasn’t the formality that struck me, but the realization that I’d somehow become the older person in the conversation.

I’m the oldest person at the museum now, and though I have friends who are older, most of the people around me are younger—college students with endless energy and a sense that life stretches far ahead of them. I work with them every day, and I see in them the same bright spark I once had. Over the past year, especially with my health issues, I’ve come to accept what I used to quietly resist: I am middle-aged. Not just in years, but in how others see me—and in how I’m beginning to see myself.

Charles Bertram Johnson’s “Now and Then” captures that awareness of time’s passage with both poignancy and grace. It traces a journey from youth’s exuberant song to the quiet wisdom of later years. The refrain that begins as “All life is built from song” evolves into something deeper: “All life is built from love.” Johnson reminds us that while youthful joy may fade, it transforms into something richer—an understanding shaped by love, endurance, and perspective.

In the gay community, that realization often feels even sharper. We live in a culture that idolizes youth—smooth skin, perfect bodies, the illusion that desire belongs only to the young. But aging brings its own kind of beauty, one rooted in truth rather than performance. When we let go of chasing who we were, we can begin to appreciate who we are.

My youth may have left nearly twenty years ago, but it left behind something far more lasting: gratitude. The song may sound softer now, but perhaps that’s because it’s finally being sung with love.

About the Poet

Charles Bertram Johnson (1880–1956) was an American poet whose work appeared in the early decades of the 20th century. Though little is known about his life, his poetry often explores the quiet transitions of aging, the nature of love, and the search for meaning in ordinary experience. In poems like “Now and Then,” Johnson captures the gentle shift from youthful exuberance to mature reflection, reminding us that the truest songs of life are often those sung softly in its later years.

Meeting Ourselves
By Vachel Lindsay

We met ourselves as we came back
As we hiked the trail from the north.
Our foot-prints mixed in the rainy path
Coming back and going forth.
The prints of my comrade’s hob-nailed shoes
And my tramp shoes mixed in the rain.
We had climbed for days and days to the North
And this was the sum of our gain:
We met ourselves as we came back,
And were happy in mist and rain.
Our old souls and our new souls
Met to salute and explain—
That a day shall be as a thousand years,
And a thousand years as a day.
The powers of a thousand dreaming skies
As we shouted along the trail of surprise
Were gathered in our play:
The purple skies of the South and the North,
The crimson skies of the South and the North,
Of tomorrow and yesterday.

About the Poem

Vachel Lindsay’s “Meeting Ourselves” is a gentle yet profound reflection on life’s cyclical journey—how we travel forward only to encounter the echoes of our former selves. The poem captures a moment of recognition and renewal: two travelers retrace their steps and find their footprints mingling in the rain. It’s both literal and symbolic—an image of physical return and inner reconciliation.

Lindsay’s use of repetition and musical rhythm mirrors the rhythm of walking and the heartbeat of realization. The biblical echo—“a day shall be as a thousand years, and a thousand years as a day” (2 Peter 3:8)—reminds us that time itself folds and blurs when we reach moments of self-understanding or spiritual peace. The mingling of “old souls and new souls” beautifully suggests that transformation doesn’t erase who we were; it redeems and embraces it.

For LGBTQ+ readers, especially gay men, this poem may hold an added resonance. The act of meeting ourselves can evoke the powerful experience of coming out or reconciling with the self we once had to hide. Many queer people spend years walking in two directions at once—forward toward authenticity, backward toward fear or memory. When Lindsay writes, “We met ourselves as we came back / And were happy in mist and rain,” it can read as a quiet kind of liberation: joy found not in public sunlight, but in the private, tender mist where two selves—and perhaps two men—meet without shame.

The comrade whose footprints mingle with the speaker’s invites another layer of interpretation. In early 20th-century literature, male companionship often carried an intimacy that could not be spoken openly. The simple image of their tracks interlaced in the rain becomes, for a modern gay reader, a symbol of shared experience, endurance, and connection—love that exists naturally, though quietly, within the elements.

In that sense, the poem feels like a reconciliation not only of the self but of desire: the realization that one can walk beside another man and find peace, joy, and completeness—“happy in mist and rain.”

Ultimately, “Meeting Ourselves” speaks to anyone who has learned to love themselves after a long climb. It’s about journeying through struggle or distance, only to discover that the person waiting at the end of the trail is a wiser, gentler version of who we’ve always been.

The mingled footprints remind us that our past and present selves—and the people who’ve walked beside us—can coexist. We do not need to abandon the person we were to become the person we are. In mist and rain, under skies of “tomorrow and yesterday,” we find that the journey has brought us home to ourselves.

About the Poet

Vachel Lindsay (1879–1931) was an American poet known for his musical, chant-like verse and his belief that poetry should be spoken and performed aloud. Born in Springfield, Illinois, Lindsay traveled widely—often on foot—exchanging poems and drawings for food and lodging. His works often celebrated spiritual vision, democracy, and the common man, blending mysticism with American folk imagery.

“Meeting Ourselves” was written during Lindsay’s later period in the 1920s, when his poetry turned increasingly inward and mystical, exploring the soul’s search for renewal and divine connection. Though his fame waned late in life, Lindsay left a lasting mark on American poetry for his pioneering rhythmic style and his ability to transform ordinary experiences into moments of revelation.

While there is no definitive record of his sexuality, Lindsay’s poetry often conveys an intense affection for male companionship and an ideal of spiritual brotherhood that modern readers sometimes interpret through a queer lens. His recurring themes of duality, self-reconciliation, and soulful connection invite a range of readings—including those that speak deeply to LGBTQ+ experiences of identity and inner harmony.

“Meeting Ourselves,” like much of his work, reminds us that the greatest journeys are those that lead inward.