This afternoon brightness, this blinding flood...

(letter to her with map, terror & excitement)

Rain echoes through the hollow of this
late afternoon light & the shadow
of my hand drags across the Great Lakes,
across states, & it shakes, & O how inexplicable.

I said love when I know I meant predisposition.
I meant empty rooms, sun cascading
through slats after rain, that life I can easily
imagine & want. I meant there is no way

to express the complex architecture of
what you are to me - the you you are in words,
the body of you, the you I don’t even know.
I know what I hope for.  This afternoon

brightness, this blinding flood, this thing
we’ve built up, this heaviness masquerading
as lightness & I just don’t know
what to say.  I can see you standing there,

can almost hear your voice.  I can see the sun
& it’s setting & there are the two of us facing
each other, people made out of words with
real bodies, standing together & breathing.

Nate Pritts