“Dear Miss November 1852”

“Dear Miss November 1852,” from the Unopened Fan Mail

for emily

You can hear it getting colder.

Leaves dyed into the street, a plumb coat walking

a fox on a leash. Outside, no trees

the color of apple

skin, your ears cool as

the plumbing–the domestic coin faucet

chuckling its currency. Ours was the gold standard

of drunkenness. Your dress could’ve been a swimsuit

for the women of 1852. Sleeping with many

was the same as just a few; either view you see

less of them than trees. Occasionally feeling

dumb as a pumpkin

without a face, knowing only what not to say. Snow watching

the tide of umbrellas

enter the building like questions. Revolving doors

of conversation. A heap of apprehensions, leaves

you burnt into hours

of smoke smelt on a walk

you take, wide and isolated as

a lake. Skin off

your knee like chalk; something to nurse. Sometimes you were

a dusk of concerns. Dawdling, you traced my hand

as if answering by proxy, alluding to the blue

nights that eye you like a room

locking behind you. Each morning

you wake and your desktop’s arranged

by a river, the drawings and photos under the current

of some shadow you cast last night. Like reading subtitles, your red ears hearing

the next room’s laughter like a falling-down

wall, familiar as the address of your house. How certain people feel

old to you as trees–you miss them as the leaves

become the street. Whenever you embrace them, they leave

marks like bark, creased in your palms and arms.