Something Missing
I always practiced writing, even when I sucked (an arguable point in time that may still exist). When I wasn’t practicing with fiction, which was too often, I made a point of turning everything else into a writing project.
Years ago I wrote an email to a loved one who was far away. I liked it a lot and a year after writing it I made it into this prose poem. I go to it every so often and change this word or that word. It’s finished now so here it is. If you feel so inclined please share it using the social media tools below.
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Took the subway this Thursday instead of driving. Wanted to avoid the traffic and nasty weather outside (the day’s snowstorm would’ve blinded me on the road). Got there, and I saw this obnoxiously loud group on my uptown ride on the E train. They got on at Continental Avenue, and were talking in that language/code that I could never decipher.
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Letter to a Stranger
Dear Person I Don’t Know,
As a kid I tried my best to stay away from mirrors.
My reflection stared back at me one day, and I realized that I was not very attractive: pimples, an overbite, twenty extra pounds. Made uncomfortable in my own skin, I smile when I remember my first attempt at love with a skinny brown girl I cared for, but didn’t know very well.
In her basement we each held the other and I forgot to feel nervous about my own nakedness – that feeling of having the eyes of the world on me.
Though you would know, if you knew me, that those years are still not completely gone. I still look in the mirror. I’m still not happy.
You would know too, if you knew me, that I saw in that girl an unreal perfection based on her real imperfections. Her gangly arms and legs held me tight and rubbed themselves against my skin with all the care I had assumed there would be from one who was supposed to love you.
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