To whom it may concern
1.
To whom it may concern:
I love you,
and I’ve wanted to
tell you for some time, now.
The thought of you is something I hold
confidently, comfortingly in
the palm of my hand.
I cradle it, I move it around so
I sense its particular weight.
Your presence has a way of resting
against the inside of my back, like you’re
hugging my spine.
It’s comfortable; I grow
when I am support.
These days, it’s so reflexive to
see you and think,
“Oh, if you only knew…”
It’s natural to feel that if you felt
this loved, you’d start loving me, too.
It’s a fantasy, like the ghost image sensed
between sparse and
scratched pencil lines.
Nothing inside me seems to care
what the artist intends:
even against my will,
I see what I will.
Love,
Avery
2.
To whom it may concern:
Since last we spoke,
I’ve dated and become intimate
with the meaning of “unrequited”—
I showed her my hand,
then as dealer she dealt her cards.
Now I feel flushed
down the plumbing, lost
in leaking pipes that taunt me,
those cardiac canals will haunt me.
But I’m not blinded, sadly.
My eyes still fill in
the ghost against the pencil lines,
still tell the artist’s intent to
fuck off.
That’s the sad part:
I addressed this
to whom it may concern.
But now I’ve found out
the only one concerned is
myself.
Love,
Avery
3.
To whom it may concern:
The metaphor of a healing wound
feels apt to describe the way
a scar has slowly formed.
There’s no distracting sting when
silly air floats by boldly and
whispers to my red flesh—
instead now, I just reflexively look down,
and with my eyes I bow low to
the off-color shape that
outlines my mistakes.
Sometimes when I’m stretched a certain way
I feel not a pain sensation
but more the somber memory of
an infection that left a scar.
Know thine enemy; I’m trying…
You’re a foe that won with
your carefree and clueless sword
and like cinderella with a shoe,
my scar always will fit your blade.
Avery