Letters to Marseille

Blue ink, one jasmine pressed inside

April took you north for work
Two papers and one brave coat
I stayed with the terrace and the jasmine
And whatever you wrote back
Every Sunday, same hour
I answer you by hand
The weather, your mother, the man downstairs
And one last line I always cross out

They refused me in March
Refused me again in June
Paper is a patient country
It goes where I cannot

Letters to Marseille
Blue ink, one jasmine pressed inside
I cannot cross the water
So I send the words I used to hide

Everything
Letters to Marseille

This month you sent a photograph
Your window, a foreign sea gone gold
I pinned it by my pillow
Your view instead of you
On the back, in your hand
"Write the whole letter next time"
You've been counting
You know what I take out

This morning I didn't cross it out
I folded it before I could read it back
Four words in my mother's language
It's somewhere over the water now

Letters to Marseille
Blue ink, one jasmine pressed inside
I could not cross the water
So I sent the words I used to hide

Sunday, the terrace, no letter yet
I've started another one anyway
Letters to Marseille