Christina Goldstein

Letters to Maxwell Solomon, Unsent


1.
Well, I had, of course,
thought about it before
(your long lovely bones,
childlike rightness of every
motion) but this, darling,
was not grown in a
bubble in space--
the welling up in you,
then the hot summer
night the liquor
brought it up burning,
sent us, smelling of chlorine
and charcoal, clumsy
tumbling down and
down into a bright
roaring, all hot and
white and swimming,
and the quiet smiling morning
I left you (looking
soft as memory) for work,
and couldn’t wait
for the lunch hour to
come home and
kiss you sweetly.
But you had gone.

2.
And the day of
hermit crabs and
cheese sandwiches,
riding home with
the ocean on our lips
and in our bones,
letting my papers fly
out the car window
(the sand broke stars
in your black hair),
highway glittering, for us,
everycolor blue--
we stopped only to
hold forever
the sound of wind
through momentary
trees.

3.
That night I found you
so drunk you couldn’t
stand, couldn’t stand
yourself, tearing
at your clothes
like you didn’t know
they were nothing,
I could have laughed
the names of lovers
forever on ice and
the so many poems
about you,
Maxwell Solomon,
but here I am,
alone, with
letters, unsent.

IV.
Last night
I dreamed you
white and frail
as the picked-over
bone of a bird,
eyes like bruises
in your face,
black frozen lakes
weighting the tundra
of your skin.
It was no use,
my calling,
my self.
And now,
even my
bottle of Saint Jude’s
won’t help me
forget.

Christina Goldstein is currently living and writing in Tampa, FL. This is her first published piece.