"The mailman can't memorize..."

The mailman can’t memorize my address.

I learn about your letters through my neighbor.

He reads your cursive and his eyes grow deep.

I bet he hides them underneath his mattress,

and breathes them in at night, attempts to savor

the sentences that crumble into sleep.

He brags to me that he’s an avid reader,

I walk across the backyard, out of sorts.

I bet you wrote to me in rhyme. If I could read them,

I’m certain that I’d recognize your meter,

discern your scent in subtle choice of words,

decode your DNA, carved in the rhythm…

The first one must have been in February.

You told me then about how cold it got

and how your laces nearly froze into the asphalt

while you stood waiting for a bus, and yet how airy

the sky appeared. You felt it in your blood.

And it was more than any man could ask for.

The second came when snow began to melt.

Your sentences ran on like streams in spring,

and barely coherent, dashed and splattered.

I didn’t mind. I liked the way it felt -

the voltage in my hands. You spared no ink.

On what exactly? It could hardly matter.

The third was not a letter, but a palette.

The fourth was sheets of music torn to shreds.

And afterwards, just silence or white noise.

I check the mail simply out of habit,

I flip through books to occupy my hands,

to overwhelm the absence of your voice.