August  24/lc

He writes again and she thinks, No I don't understand it. Must I?

Tell me about her, she writes. Tia died, he writes. Tia died. I got through it by saying she is still here in my heart.  No, her, she writes. I got tired of making buildings, he writes. I waited. I thought you went to New York. She's an old friend. We both failed. It's less expensive this way. Why did you go there?

I did, she writes. The blue bowl broke. Then I came here. I dreamed of you. I heard it snowed in Guadalajara for the first time in a hundred years. In all that time we never saw snow together.

That they made significant gestures of limb and body.  You are alluding to that, yes? Cats have this talent as well.

The child withered. After that she began to wander.  He went away on business. She brought home chairs she found on the street. He didn't like that. It's a Queen Anne's chair, she said. It's junk, he said.  She brought home French boys from The Plough & Stars. He didn't know that.

No. It isn't finished, he writes. We left ourselves there, unfinished.  Today, she writes, I was staring out the tram. Far off on the Letna Plain I could see a man in a bathing suit. He stood quite still, propelling his arms through the air. As if  swimming, furiously,  vertically in place. I watched him as long as I could.  Something about it disturbed me. I thought of you then.    

Kimono years. Green nights. Smell of palm brooms, sweat, cloves. She woke up crying. He put his hand through the wall. You know all the words, he said. Get out, she said.  

Maybe she's good for you, she writes. It's lunacy, he writes.  I have stripped everything down. It's not love, it's convenience. I'm incapable, she writes. You never got that, you never understood. I'm sorry about the blue bowl, he writes. Do you have the lace still- the lace from Spain?  Do you go back? she writes. I got tired of the corruption there, he writes. I became a citizen four years ago.  You were always more capable than I, she writes.

She walks the esplanade here.  Green rum in the rain. Necklace of swans strung out behind her.  Every six months. Dinner. She would dress. She would tell herself you don't have to understand it. You don't have to think about it. Is she good for him?

Yes. And the lace from Ireland. And the wedding dress from Mexico.

She writes, I thought something terrible had happened to you. I woke up and my heart was hammering and I thought how can I know? It was snowing and the room was like ice. I tried to find you, he writes. I called R in New Mexico. I went to the Cafe, the Beach. I went anywhere I thought you would be. It is lunacy, she writes, it's berserk.  Today, I had an overwhelming desire to throw myself into the arms of the man holding onto the tram pole next to me.

She walks the iron bridge here. Holds tight to the railing. Feeds the ends of the bread to the swans. And then all the words. Night after night: the second language of the world.

She writes, I thought there must be something terribly wrong. I thought: I'll put an ad in the newspaper in Guadalajara. My father died. Perhaps that was why. It was very early. I don't sleep well here. I think it is the color of the sky.  Why did you, he writes. Why there? He comes to me in dreams, sometimes, she writes. I can understand, he writes. I loved her terribly.  Just tell yourself: he is still here in my heart.