A love letter from the dead? In this poem I imagine “the letter that does not come” and practice finding peace in the silence, a place to rest in the mystery. Published in the fabulous Vox Populi … and it will be in my new collection, The Unfolding, coming out October 1.
Some Nights Missing You
is like the letter that doesn’t come,
the one I would carefully slit open
and slowly unfold,
then hold against my chest for a moment
before letting my eyes take in the first line,
the second, the penultimate, the last,
the letter that would explain everything
in language so plain
it would make my hands shake
with the truth of it,
the one that would arrive with a return address
so I would know where to respond if I dare,
the handwriting even, familiar, easily read,
with no pages missing, no passages indecipherable,
the letter that never once has arrived,
a letter I know only by its absence.
And the emptiness itself
becomes faithful.
And the mystery becomes
the only signature I trust.