It is possible that there is no other memory
than the memory of wounds. — Czeslaw Milosz
The darkest day of the year will soon expire
its one short breath. At dusk I make the hard
climb to your letters buried in the back
of the upstairs closet. Reading your past
is like the slow pulling away
of wrapped burlap from a young Inca girl
left for the mountain gods.
Beneath the frayed blanket, red poisons
ripped the child's gut. A crack wound
from ear to skull-roaring throb, last sound
she heard on earth before ice that pierced
fingers and toes kept her a child forever.
And so you too, mindful of duty, not harm,
would have laid upon the altar the
daughter you loved most.
No longer a child, I sit on my bed,
rifling through piles of letters typed
on the crinkled skin of onion paper.
One smudge of the thumb and it seems
possible after all these years to smear
a chain of words, wipe away the disappointment.
But the words remain, black and whole.
It won't be long now before the days
begin to linger. The moon continues
to measure the months, both crescent and full
she swings her silver arc across the woods’
dark floor. This, I'll leave at the foot of the mountain:
beads for the moon, pearl and black diamonds strung
from shattered bones and letters desperately typed.
