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    Aperture
    Aperture
    Aperture
    Ebook121 pages46 minutes

    Aperture

    By Richard Valdez

    ()

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    About this ebook

    Aperture is a collection of poems drawn from life experiences and reflected
    through the emotional lens of love, joy, pain, disappointment, anguish,
    loneliness, and exhilaration. It is an opening by which the light of simple
    human experience is collimated or diffracted. Subjective, though it may, the
    poet sacrifices his mood, temperament, disposition, and personality at the
    altar of emotional expression. Aperture affirms that this emotion is the great
    leveler and that mankind- the embodiment of pure emotion- all drowns in the
    depths of its gentle wrath.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherTrafford Publishing
    Release dateOct 5, 2009
    ISBN9781426984020
    Aperture
    Author

    Richard Valdez

    Richard Claude Valdez was born in Trinidad, of English-Lebanese and Scottish-Spanish heritage. He was educated in Port-of-Spain at Franceschi Private School; Belmont Boys Intermediate Roman Catholic School and by the Order of The Holy Ghost Fathers at Our Lady of Fatima Collegefrom which he graduated. From his very early schooling, he exhibited a keen interest in literature and voraciously immersed himself in reading poetry and literature of the English masters. In Trinidad, he held a variety of employment positions with the firms: George F. Huggins; Gordon Grant and Pan American World Airways. He immigrated to Toronto, Canada in 1970 and began studies in English Literature and music at The University of Toronto and The Royal Conservatory of Music. To subsidise his studies, he worked in a wide variety of jobs as manual labourer; landscaper; machine operator and building maintenance. Later he was employed by the Canadian Civil Service in a variety of clerical and supervisory positions. He joined the teaching staff of the Toronto District School Board in 1986 and retired from the profession in 2003. During his mottled employment career, he continued to write poetry-storing away his work-in the hope of future publication. Aperture is his first publication of poetry; his second, entitled, “The Promise of the Rainbow Through My Tears”, will be published in 2010. He is currently working on his first novel with the theme of homelessness on the streets of Toronto. A classical vocalist by profession-in the field of opera and concert-he continues to perform in Canada; The United States; The Caribbean and Europe. He has added a new dimension to his musical career by composing the music to his poems, “Four Songs of Love, Loss, Languor and Longing”, to be debuted in the autumn of 2009. He resides in Toronto and northern Florida with frequent visits to his ancestral home in Trinidad & Tobago.

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      Book preview

      Aperture - Richard Valdez

      Order this book online at www.trafford.com

      or email orders@trafford.com

      Most Trafford titles are also available at major online book retailers.

      © Copyright 2009 Richard Valdez.

      All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or

      transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or

      otherwise, without the written prior permission of the author.

      Note for Librarians: A cataloguing record for this book is available from Library

      and Archives Canada at www.collectionscanada.ca/amicus/index-e.html

      Printed in Victoria, BC, Canada.

      isbn: 978-1-4251-8801-6 (sc)

      eBook: 9781426984020

      We at Trafford believe that it is the responsibility of us all, as both individuals and corporations, to make choices that are environmentally and socially sound. You, in turn, are supporting this responsible conduct each time you purchase a Trafford book, or make use of our publishing services. To find out how you are helping, please visit www.trafford.com/responsiblepublishing.html

      Our mission is to efficiently provide the world’s finest, most comprehensive book publishing service, enabling every author to experience success. To find out how to publish your book, your way, and have it available worldwide, visit us online at www.trafford.com

      Trafford rev. 9/21/2009

      7-Copyright-Trafford_Logo.ai

      www.trafford.com

      North America & international

      toll-free: 1 888 232 4444 (USA & Canada)

      phone: 250 383 6864 22730.png fax: 812 355 4082

      Contents

      A Picture

      He Left in the Season of Leaves!

      The Boy That I Once Knew

      Infant farewell

      Four Songs of Love, Loss, Languor and Longing.Love

      Loss

      Languor She Was Not There!

      Longing In the Garden of My Dreams

      There Were Nine

      The House Wherein I Grew

      Robin

      The Autumn Fall!

      Now Wake from Phantom Sleep! Sonnet

      The Morning Rose Like Any Other

      To Ray on Our Last Ride into His Woods

      Cardinal

      Evening in the Tropics

      Easter Hymn.

      He Died, the Old Man.

      I Have Nothing!

      Sunday

      In The Eye of the Storm On Visiting an Insane Asylum

      Books

      To Dylan Thomas Lament (Marwnad)

      Under the Maple Tree in the Age of Autumn

      In Passing an Estonian Church at Noonday

      This Woman, She works All Day in Her Garden

      On Canada Day (2001)

      Goin Fishin……..

      102 Edward Street On visiting my Birth House after many years.

      Corner Café

      She Kissed Me!

      There Is Someone Living In My Father’s House On passing by my old home in the summer of 1997.

      Starting Over

      Sleep

      To Someone Somewhere in Switzerland.

      Alone.

      He Left That Day

      Le Carenage A Lament

      A Green Eyed Stranger On a Bus in the East End of Toronto.

      Scatter My Roses

      Here In This Valley

      Once a Lad in Knee High Pants

      Looking East

      To Sylvia

      Slug

      This Morning

      Another day

      Conversation

      We Are All Asleep

      Destiny

      The Day After Written in Despondency the Day After.

      In Parting at Maracas Bay

      At the Seashore

      A Candle on My Porch

      Raindrop

      Rain

      I Love The Rain

      The Viewing

      Empty Glasses

      I Lay Like A Slug

      A Date

      Worms

      House of Refuge

      An Inconvenient Moment

      Impotence

      A Theatre on old Yonge Street Circa 1975

      Father’s Day

      Two Sweet Little Old Italian Ladies West of Oakwood

      A Drunk at Ormond Beach

      The Incessant Itch of Old Age

      One Day

      I Am Dead

      Alphabetical List of First Lines.

      Bibliography

      Dylan Marlais Thomas (27 October 1914 – 9 November 1953)

      And Death Shall Have No Dominion.

      Published in the New English Weekly in March 1933

      Fern Hill- (Though I sang in my chains like the sea)

      Published and written 1n 1946

      With grateful appreciation to Dylan Thomas and his publishers for the use of the last two lines of these epic poems.

      Special thanks to Dave Murrell, pianist, for his piano arrangements of

      Four Songs of Love, Loss, Languor and Longing.

      Note

      Richard Claude Valdez was born of

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