MORE MEMORIES OF JUDGE HENRY LEYTE VIDAL

Judge Mary Barzee wrote this beautiful post in memory of her friend:

Leyte died on a glorious spring day. He would have loved this past weekend, and, had he not been in the hospital, he would have been outside, coaching Danny’s softball team, playing golf or boating. Henry heartily loved life. He was a compassionate, genteel man. He was a generous friend. He loved food—French mussels, fresh anchovies and garlic in vinegar, spaghetti and clams. He drank scotch. He loved art and music. He’d been to the Opera at La Scala, he sang and played guitar in a rock band, he liked The Black Eyed Peas. The judge was a great dancer. And he loved his boys more than anything. His passing is our great loss.

Rumpole notes that the loss of Judge Leyte-Vidal, a man who apparently loved life and lived it to the fullest has left us sad ever since we heard the news. We sometimes take solice in poetry and think this poem by Keats, one of our favorites, seems appropriate at this moment in our lives:

An Irish Airman Forsees His Death:

I know that I shall meet my fate
Somewhere among the clouds above;
Those that I fight I do not hate,
Those that I guard I do not love;

My county is Kiltartan Cross,
My countrymen Kiltartan's poor,
No likely end could bring them loss
Or leave them happier than before.

Nor law, nor duty bade me fight,
Nor public men, nor cheering crowds,
A lonely impulse of delight
Drove to this tumult in the clouds;

I balanced all, brought all to mind,
The years to come seemed waste of breath,
A waste of breath the years behind
In balance with this life, this death.


Keats. Barzee. Good company both.