Letter to Someone I Do Not Know


Dearest ------

I've watched your letters from a distance.  These eddies
spiralling from the cracks in my basement walls form 
a blue smoke of pleasure, the kind of intoxication 
that comes after slipping off a cliff while laughing.

What do you mean by "love"?  I wonder, do you mean
a hollow heart with a child's marbles inside, which
in loving remains the untouched wholeness of a new sky.

Or do you mean a magnetic bit on a disk, an iota 
of information, infinitely replicable without burning 
the original atoms of the same message, replicated.

Or I suppose you mean I am part of the intricate mosaic 
embedded in everyone's eyes.  The part that wraps lovers 
firmly as jungle vines and sparkles the world's crystal.

Sometimes I wonder if your soul is held by angels who leave streaks of
multi-colored white for those to follow, from the last life into this.
Would you remember the rose petals in rainwater and the needles in wax?

We will not get beyond these, I suppose.  

In an innocent sheet of white wove paper, I wrap your words,
carefully, as a baby who has not yet woken.

Love,
----------