Dearest Margaret,

I so envy you-

Downtown must be ablaze with Christmas decorations and everyone
would have their invitation to Amanda's party by now- I shall miss it all!
The laughter, the clinking of glasses, the Colonel's nephew and his glorious lips-

I shall miss your entrance, luminous in the latest from Paris;
I would be there with you, we a pair of doves- no, not doves, moonlight
spilling onto everything- onto the flowers, the baskets of gifts,
the lapels of men- no one can deny the moonlight.

Every detail of the last soiree we attended together is still fresh
Oh if the walls could talk! Collapsing and crumbling into a hail of champagne,
rivers of it running through and around us. I see the rainbow lights

from the grand hall chandelier reflecting like gems in your curls. There is no
such light here. It's pale blue and sticky heat, palm trees and dirt roads,
a changeless old that builds up from the ground and waits.

It buzzes and swells in the wrong-skinned people here,
I see it's disapproval in their eyes. I want to be free of it, run from this place,
fly over the trial and mother and Tommy- way beyond this eternal summer

harnessing me here. Yes. I do know that summers eventually eclipse
turn to autumn with it's brilliant reds and orange fires.
Fires that can burn it to the ground, burn it clean.

Lord knows it's not autumn Margaret,
and even with the sun blaring
I can't seem to forget
this winter has just begun.

Thalia

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