postcard of virginia pines

We are neither so old as to be bridges

Nor so young as to be forgetful.

A matte postcard of Virginia pines

Claws its way through my life,

As every month I clear my desk and find it

Still sitting there.

I am sorry I have not replied.

It would be simpler

Were it because I loved you too much

Or even not at all anymore.

The truth is your truth

Has become something I am afraid of.

Because it is simple.

Because I knew it when we were children.

In the brief hours when I make it back to boston

We make love but

I never break through to you anymore

Which is unsurprising because

My broken pieces no longer lie

So close to the surface as they once did.

My fingers calloused, a thousand poems written,

And a taught anger I use as a tool everyday

How could we be the same?

And you touching a hundred burns

And roaming for the first time along

the Appalachian spine, where did you expect to find me?

We are deep into the pages now,

And it feels like the only way I can give my story

These days is to sell it,

but I can’t sell you my life.

So what on earth could I write back

If you talk about Christmas

And say you still love me

And send a Polaroid of brown Virginia pines?

It feels like there is no paper in the house

That can contain the years of silence,

Though probably all we need

Is to seal a few blank pages with the cost of a stamp.