A Valentine from Grama

Grama wrote down these words to live by,
from a book she loved. She gave them to me
soon after I was born.
I think of them today as a valentine from her.

"You can't describe love, and you can't define it.
Only it goes with you all your life.
I think that love is more like a light that you carry.
At first childish happiness keeps it lighted
and after that romance.
Then motherhood lights it and then duty...
and maybe after that sorrow. You wouldn't
think that sorrow could be a light would you?
But it can. And then after that, service lights it,
Yes...I think that is what love is to a woman..
a lantern in her hand."

-Bess Streeter Aldrich