The Letter

And in the end, all that is really left

Is a feeling—strong and unavoidable—

That somehow we deserved something better.

That somewhere along the line things

Got fouled up. And that letter from whoever’s

In charge, which certainly would have set

Everything straight between us and the world,

Never reached us. Got lost somewhere.

Possibly mislaid in some provincial station.

Or sent by mistake to an old address

Whose new tenant put it on her dresser

With the curlers and the hairspray forgetting

To give it to the landlord to forward.

And we still wait like children who have sent

Two weeks’ allowance far away

To answer an enticing advertisement

From a crumbling, yellow magazine,

Watching through years as long as a childhood summer,

Checking the postbox with impatient faith

Even on days when mail is never brought.

Source: Daily Horoscope: Poems (Graywolf Press, 1986)