Poetry

While Miss Capp, older than the Constitution,
droned of checks and balances, I dutifully
filled my notebook (college-lined), and prayed

each beast tells his own story
this is my story to you
I have loved you seventeen years
and both of us are not young any more
we live in another country

In that bad year, in a city to have now no name,
In the already-dark of a winter’s day, our feet

At rest-hour a rhythmic
faint squink, squink
in the top bunk
farthest from the counselor:

Dear lost sharer
of silences,
I would send you a letter