Steady and Clear

        "I love you from way back," I said to my wife as I kissed her at bedtime the other night.  First time I'd ever put it that way.

        But it's true.  1950 is when I fell in love with Connie.  62 years.

        Then today in a review of the "Collected Poems" of Jack Gilbert, from his poem "The Abnormal Is Not Courage," I came upon lines that resonate:

                      The marriage
                      Not the month's rapture...The beauty
                      That is of many days.  Steady and clear.