Modes
in a letter
I go with the discourse
and stay to discourse
in love
I varnish a crucifix
and call it love
in the garden
I am of the garden
and come home
Poems on the topic: letter
Poems on the topic “letter” on Poets.by.
Correspondence
How did they do it, those long-
distance lovers of old, waiting
months for a letter to make
its way by sea?
And when it did, oh the slow
parsing of its every word!
Onion-skin paper
like a bed of salt.
Cursive writing
like Jonah’s gourd vine,
the work of a single night.
Cold Front
With the cold front
came news of your death—
a failed bypass—
and a skim of snow
that vanishes at the sun’s touch.
Soon, only shadows are white,
like the letters
I keep trying to form
as my pen runs out of ink.
* * *
Throwing out the letters written to you
In my blood,
Is both the most relieving thing,
And the most heart shattering thing.
Amorcito
Good morning amorcito. I know it's early but I just couldn't help but sit down and write. I woke up and the first thing I thought about were your eyes. I thought of how brown they are and how that's really common, but on you my love, they're more lovely than the brightest pair of blue or the warmest pair of amber. I thought of how your left eye twitches when you laugh really hard, the kind that makes you gasp for breath. I thought of how eyes are said to be windows to the soul and how obvious my love for you must be the second you look into them. Maybe you don't need to. Maybe my love is so great that you can see it pouring out of every inch of me. It feels like that sometimes. Just at the mention of your name, my bones sing and my heart races faster than any marathon runner. My stomach does impossible flips and, despite the nausea, I can't help but be excited. It sounds dramatic. I know. But it's true and if that makes me weird then I'm the biggest clown you ever met! Finally, I thought of the most wonderful thing. I thought of the day I'll look into your extraordinary, perfectly average brown eyes and see the love I feel for you returned. My amorcito, if you understand anything in this letter I want you to understand that it's this final thought that gives me the courage to live through another day. You are my inspiration, my motivation, for all things great and small.
The Almirah
Somewhere in your corners deep,
Lies my love's first letter to me.
Somewhere in your corners deep,
Lies my dreams smothered dead.
Somewhere, hidden, swaddled in clothes
Trembles my fears, dark and black.
Somewhere, among the faded silks
A chempaka flower, fragrance faint.
These books that you hold for me,
These clothes that you keep for me,
These souvenirs of my forgotten past
These remnants of my self, uncared for.
One day, not long after have I left,
Somebody would sweep it all off,
Give you a new coat and polish your glass.
New clothes, new dreams, sparkles of a new life
I'M GOING AWAY
I'm going away,
I'll send a letter one day,
don't tell her just yet
or at least not today.
I'm going away
to discover my life's destined way.
I won't mind the long drive, I bet
I will survive at least till May.
Many words I know I will get
about the pain and the sorrow and the wrong I have made,
but don't tell her just yet.
I'll send a letter one day
and there will be tears running down the cheeks,
but Please!... Not today.
Letter
I wrote a letter
For you to remember
The days we spent together
And the days we spent away with each other
I put my soul into it
And I know you’ll read it
I wonder if it’ll be the last letter
For you to remember the latter
I’ll give you this piece
This piece of my soul
Where I put it in a paper
And let it burn into you.
I wonder if you got the message
This message from my heart
This message from my soul
With this it all ends.
you
I've spent hours contemplating
the words to say to you
but no combination
of twenty six different letters
could ever accurately capture
even a sliver of what this feeling is.
Peeling Red Letters
I enjoyed peeling your name,
off of my white wall.
I gave you all I had,
you brought little if at all.
Your red letters lay in scraps,
on my otherwise clean gray floor.
Next I get to scoop you up,
and throw you out the back door.
I know you didn’t mean it,
I really just don’t care.
I looks as if you just found out,
you get what you give and that’s fair.
Of This Great Voiceless Love
Of this great voiceless love of mine for you
There is no word to your heart out of mine
That may go winging through the whispering night.
Look only then for laughter in my letters
As I from day to day The Fool rehearse.
And if one blushing phrase too boldly written
Inscribes too fervently that I am yours,
Believe it only penmanship and style,
Or the careless informality of friends.
Well I Lost
everything you gave me—
the pen in Dublin
at the Post Office,
your letter back in
London,
your address in
Philadelphia.
You poor bastard,
you'll never hear
from me again.
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