Splendor in the Grass

Vaհe H Apelian

 

Our house in Cincinnati, painted by Arin Ch Artwork  in Lebanon.

For a generation the movie Splendor in the Grass remains unforgettable. I was fifteen years old when I saw the movie in Beirut.  Warren Beaty and Natalie Wood remain imprinted in that generation's mind, as the actors who played the teenage lovers that circumstances and youthful follies kept them apart. I do not think they outgrew or could change that perception.

Every now and then I watch glimpses of it on Youtube. I have friends who have told that they do the same, including Ara Mekhsian who translated the segment of the William Wordsworth’s poem that was central to the movie

But I have another reason to continue to relate to the movie.  After her recovery, Wilma saw Bud for the last time, who was married and was doing farm work. His family had lost the fortune they had. She asked him if he is happy. He said, he does not ask that question any longer. What is the point? He said, you got to take things as they come along. Wilma nodded in agreement and said that she is engaged to a boy in Cincinnati and that should Bud meet him, he will like him. 

That was what Williiam Wordsworth's poem all about. That “nothing can bring back the hour, the splendor in the grass.” But, we need not grieve” but “rather find strength in what remains behind.”

It so happened that twists and turns of our lives would have me and Marie move to Cincinnati, where my job took me. We lived in Cincinnati for almost a quarter of century and created a life there. I look back with tender memories of wonderful friends we never thought we would have, and for a way of life we never thought we would create.  

I attached is Ara Mekhsian’s translation and the segment of movie that pertained to the poem.  

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