Wool-Gathering (II)

This is a rainy day phenomenon. A too many books with cobbled streets read treacle-y, bred from a sense of silence. What’s out there? Wind chimes and dust devils. Sewer tunnels. Gravel pits and the buzzing afternoons of summer. But for today, gray valentines spice the tongue. Sheets draw down the windows and shapes go awry. Tea cakes and wedding cookies are stale on the counter and we eye them anyhow. Palates bored on hard candy seek dough, a buttery vacation. Later, we hang like bats from the rafters, await disturbance and dusk. We collect. We are frightening in numbers. Attic box treasure hunt. Tintypes of aunts we don’t know. A sneeze and an asthmatic wheeze. Cold spot in the corner, cold in the cellar. War letters in indecipherable script. Why does paper decay? Thin and crisp like wafers, sheaves of correspondence too many to inspect.