"Poety is something more philosophic and of graver import than history, since its statements are of the nature of universals, whereas those of history are singulars."
-Aristotle

by Jennifer Bishop

To the esteemed editors of Primum Mobile,

I must ask your forgiveness for my impudence and pray that you would be willing to act as mediators between myself and my dear friend, Sir Elliot Oldcastle. He follows the wind as the tide follows the moon and in a balmy summer some years ago, I lost him. His most recent correspondence that I have discovered has led me to you. If you could kindly deliver this short note to him I shall always be,

*          *          *

I crossed the bridge where you had spent
Your time so many years before
With pensive gaze and restless hands
You held your thoughts deep in your core.

I'd meet you there when wish was thought
The distance always worth the walk.
We'd share our souls and bear our dreams,
The sun would set and still we'd talk.

To break you from your solitude,
I'd laugh and hold you in my arms,
But sorrow steals up like a thief
And night grows dark, despite the stars.

Your scars in moonlight faintly glowed
Where her voice still lingered on
So neither of us said a word
And waited there against the dawn.

My scars glowed too beneath the moon
I held my pain there like a jewel,
Yet when you spoke (I thought you knew)
I felt their burning cool.

But sunlight burns up memories
Just as it burns up early fog
And what our hearts together whispered
Turns to lonely monologue.

And honesty grows distant,
And our words become too loud,
And all those thoughts which once were sisters
Seem to vanish in a crowd.

Despite the rift I still believe
Our rended hearts could beat as one
And the damage they have done us
By us both could be undone.

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