On Finding an Old Love Letter
The
occasion came I made myself take very envelope
I’d
tucked under the sturdy structure of decades I made
myself
open the only one I found of yours I made myself
open
it again and tell me from the distance
we
stand now here one living and you dead
I
didn’t just receive word that would you yes you would
wait
for me while I summited the mountain you’d watch
from
the bottom of the world and I’d lace the boots
you
gave me and tuck those laces and lick the last of you
from
my mouth with my tongue and let the wind in
and
walk and walk I’d walk the whole range while you waited
and one mountain it wouldn’t be enough while you waited and
so
you made me a great stick to take with me the next time
I
saw you and I didn’t notice then how weak
the
climb had made me and I wanted you to take me
home
with you but the mountain…and because I’ve never been much
of
a climber – my feet are blind – I let myself go down
like
the carriage of my body was made by a cooper
the
drying hoops and sinews once new once pliant
to
intention I don’t tend to notice what’s cracking what’s brittle
what
gulps of altitude I head rush on high and sick
to
my stomach and come down hard on the
of some last season’s avalanche, on empty bowels, on cliché after
cliché
of vultures circling when all along I wanted crows
because
by then by the time your letter arrived late and torn
I
was on the other side of the world and you’d stopped
watching summits but the letter and I opened it again today
and
I wet my lips just in case you were still inside: it
said:
The door’s open
come in I’ll wait
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