Consider this: a letter misdirected from an
Apartment long condemned to leak and grief
And the eventual veneer of gentrification. Mold
Blooms at the fold like an ink sketch of two faces
Lost to distracted thought. The stamp is from a
Nation conceived out of wishes and unshared
Fever dreams.
It is not addressed to you.
You open it, determined to know if the news
Confirms what you fear most: that daylight
Is only ever an illusion; that all things bright
Will fracture if exposed to the heat of expectation,
To the harsh demands of hope; that joy is
Wallpaper on intractable stains. The envelope
Tears too quickly.
You cannot read the language.
And yet—you’ve spoken it once. You’ve exhaled,
Breathless, sent words in whorls through cobwebs.
The ink smeared at the margins bears the spiral
Prints of your touch. You remember enough—
Cigarettes in stairwells, a car parked at a curb
Under darkening rain—to know that nowhere is
Ever forgotten.
| Sarah Grey‘s short fiction and Rhysling-nominated poetry have appeared in Lightspeed, Nightmare, Uncanny, Strange Horizons, Fantasy Magazine, and elsewhere. She has degrees in Art History, Medieval Studies, and law, speaks multiple languages poorly, and enjoys world travel and roller-skating. She lives in California with her family and an excessive quantity of cats. |  |