Rescuing the Purple Princess

I spent the whole of Good Friday 2012 crawling around on my hands and knees, clearing out the loft. This had been a long time coming. When my husband (then boyfriend) moved into my small flat in 2008, some of his belongings and what seemed like half of my life had to be moved into the space above our bedroom.

It had stayed there, unloved and ignored, ever since – partly because we had never got round to sorting it out and partly because an invasion of wasps the previous summer had effectively put the loft out of bounds.

Eventually, my husband agreed that I could venture up there. In the end, I found a few dead wasps and ladybirds scattered about, a selection of cobwebs and, in one corner, an empty wasps’ nest – which I removed quite easily. In fact, it was beautiful – like a paper-thin honeycomb without the honey.

Once the hatch was closed we were faced with the task of sorting through box after box of old paperwork, bags of clothes, books, memorabilia and other assorted life detritus which may or may not have had sentimental value.

I smiled at the irony of finding a couple of crucifixes (from my Gothic phase about 20 years ago) on Good Friday, and left for another day the big box of vinyl that I’d never play again.

There was inevitably lots of stuff had stored for no reason, plus old printers and various electrical goods that no longer worked or were surplus to requirements. Then I started sifting through a box containing keepsakes ranging from a cassette tape given to me on my 18th birthday to a ticket stub from my favourite Prince concert in 1988 to the cards I was sent on my 40th and 50th birthdays – stories of a life.

More importantly, I also found something I thought I had lost for ever: a poem written for me in 1985 by Gill, one of my best friends, who had died of cancer on this very same day in 2009.

I had wanted to find this poem so that it could be read out at my wedding in April 2010 but had failed to do so with only two weeks to go. Then, at the eleventh hour, I was saved by a mutual friend who had inherited some of Gill’s possessions. He had come across a photocopy of the poem in a folder and sent it to me, wondering if I might be interested.

But here’s the thing: he didn’t know that I’d been looking for the poem, and I didn’t know Gill had made a copy of it. I burst into tears and thanked her out loud. I was sure she had guided him to it. The poem was duly read on my wedding day and there wasn’t a dry eye in the house.

The universe moves in mysterious ways. Some would say it was a coincidence that I found the handwritten original of the poem on the third anniversary of my friend’s death. I would say it was perfect timing, and I’m telling myself the story that she had a hand in it.

So not only did I create inner and outer space by getting rid of stuff I didn’t need any more, I also found something incredibly important to me that will now be stored in a very safe place and treasured for the rest of my life.

Here is the poem, lost and found:

 

WITH LOVE TO THE PURPLE PRINCESS

So many thoughts
Bubble
Inside
Where does the love go to when it disappears?
Into deep blue eyes
That wait quiescently with the
silent knowledge of what’s to come
How could I ever give back
The hours and the days I’ve stolen
from your life?
Wish on a star and pray
For all that comes to she who waits –
And come it will –
If there is any justice left
In this godless world.
Life, spent in rooms, tired and drawn
from winter grey.
Steeped with overwrought emotions.
The place I never want to go back to.
The only glad memory of which
is the vision of the Purple Princess
Standing in front of her mirror,
watching the reflection smile back
and shine.

Gill Smith
3.6.85