To Emily — Peatsmoke

To Emily (this is my letter)

Is it always a gateless gate, an unmarked path— Is
it all waves and gyre, or sometimes solid? My heart is
all weightless gaze and pining, my
only friend silent if I let her
be, we having never met or married, but two
of a kind, regardless— or maybe not so kind, in my case— the
jury still out. Maybe not even friends! Between the World
and me, there are no secrets but it’s obvious that
I am not told everything, never
wholly in the know or in the Now. My friend wrote
holy gorgeous nothings, pencil strokes to
God, scratches like “fossil bird tracks” to Higginson and me—
but still, I unfold The
untouchable envelopes online, the simple
creases full of news
from afar, from Amherst, from that
house with a grassy roof. Nature
doesn’t care, I’m told—
so why then does the moon come to my window every night with
pale and tender
gaze, paperlike Majesty?
I want to think the faintly cratered moon is in Her
handwriting, a penciled Message
she didn’t want me to miss
and so she wrote it on a stone, committed
it to lunar memory and loneliness, which is where I live, to
unfold this message with my trembling hands
and hold the moon like a pebble I
want to toss at her window but cannot.
It would have been impossible to foresee—
to go to sea, to see the love for
all the wild nights, the found harbor, the love
like a ship smashing waves of
chalk-like lunar white the color of Her
dress. Her —Sweet —
trembling lips, ignored by her countrymen —
Who were they to judge
what she so tenderly —
might have whispered —like a poem —to the moon, of
A gateless gate at the end of her garden. Directions to someone lost in the road. Maybe even— Me.

To Emily (blue uncertain stumbling)

I
heard
a poet say some things she would never put up With:
Fly, flown, flew? Blow, blown, Blue?
buzz and bustling, gossip and guessing, grammar, certainty — uncertain—
when are you sure? stumbling
I never am, not even drunk, my head weightless. My Buzz—
died— the second Between
The second I spoke and the
Stillness of the first light —
in counting, first, second, and
the recounting of my story: me—
Room, my own white dress untouched, the empty lawn between the world and me And
Was I going to live like this? then
like me, you, a crack of lightning, a bright river in the sky, sky, happening forever, the the
the sudden rain in open Windows
Stillness after, like any thunderstorm, but now the desk wet, torn envelopes like poetic confetti— failed
in your lifetime to contain you —and
the years passed, then
Air — What else? I,
Between this and that, could
(the echo not gone) not —
Heaves of my breath, alone with your book—think, but suddenly I can — I see
of all the loneliness and stars, whispered familiar gorgeous nothings to
Storm, to sea, to God, to me. I see you, you see —

About the author

Chris Huntington is the author of the prize-winning novel, Mike Tyson Slept Here. His poetry and non-fiction have appeared in numerous anthologies and outlets, including National Public Radio and The New York Times. He currently lives and works in Singapore. More information is available at www.chrishuntingtononline.com.

About the artist

A professional actor and director, Bruce Turk has maintained a practice of visual art for over 35 years. He studied drawing at Northwestern University, was mentored by Yukio Nishinarita in Japan, and studied painting at the Art Students’ League of New York.