the postcard

‘Tis a simple postcard,

Just a short sentiment,

Yet one of lengthy regard—

Mailed past miles as well as years—

That ushers me home upon a memory

And quickens once again the slow-spinning

Spheres

Of true feeling, tried friendship, and time.

On front is a black-and-white trapping of thought,

A picture turned pantomime,

Reminding me that every beauty

Bounds from a single beginning:

 

Mountains from waters raise—

Snow-laced, haloed by mist—

And stoop that they might appraise

Their crowns in a silver lake,

Over which the wind weaves rippled reflections,

Spreading the shimmer-cloth to where the shorelines

Take

And seam the threads of loch unto land;

In the foreground, fingers of a driftwood crowd

Stretch upward for the sky-strand,

As if heaven has yet to be touched

From such earth-engineered designs.

 

Then, turning it over,

As one would spin by stem

A tiny dream-leafed clover,

My eyes trace her written hand:

“There is something about this picture,” she penned,

“Seems like you could look at it forever

And

Think of a million different days.”

And, with a sigh, to the flipside I return,

To the still-frame, to the sways

Of, yes, a million different moments—

And, too, one wishful whenever.

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—12.02.1999, revisited

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