The Room Elsewhere

In Another Town

Across The Border

So Very

Far Away

If you roll a postcard landscape, it will fit inside a bottle. I discovered this when I held everything I wanted to tell you between my palms, and worried it so much it shriveled to a cylinder so thin it fit inside the empty coke bottle you left on the windowsill.

I used cork to keep the second thoughts from escaping. Coke bottles are surprisingly soundproof. Even the apologies find it hard to rattle the glass enough for me to want to turn and look. With all the silence that is left inside this house I sometimes wonder if I should pour out the content for something other than quiet. So far I’ve kept that bottle closed. I guess I’m stronger than I feel.

I tossed all those words into the sea yesterday. The water wasn’t deep enough and the tide brought you back each time I tried until eventually my arms turned to lead and I could throw just as well left as right. Should I thank you for that?

The weather’s been nice at least. You would have liked it.

Am I allowed to say, wish you were here?