POEMS
DEAD LETTER
How wise you were, my dear, to go elsewhere:
Your native country or another shore,
The landscape of the olive and the vine,
Incredibly green valleys where everything is green,
The marketplaces and the holy places;
Museums, too, where all the masterpieces
Are genuine; and you, learning a new language,
Escaped from the imaginary voyage.
I have sat as in a darkened room,
My interest else-and-everywhere.
An adolescent in the Old Folks' Home
Is not more
iII
at ease than I am here
And now, dreaming of travel, knowing I can't
Endure its privations even in advance.
I start from nothing and reside at once,
Love, and feel that it is impotent.
But you abide, whether near or far,
Familiar and unutterably odd,
In
the abyss or merely on the brink
Of love: perfect and preposterous.
And having no idea where you are,
Addressing you is like addressing God:
To think
That you were one of us!
