THE LETTER SAFE.

A WOMAN AND HER SECRET LOVERS' LETTER

She has the letter safe,
tucked out of sight,
pushed between breasts
beneath her dress.

She has read it so
often she knows it
by heart, each word,
each phrase he used,

the images his words
had conjured. Her
hands shook when
the letter came, her

husband just across
the table; his eyes on
his own mail not hers,
his dark eyes scanning

the page. She thought
she had blushed when
the words touched her
eyes, when the images

rose before her sight.
Now in her room alone,
her husband out on his
business, she pulls out

the letter again, holds it
between fingers, sniffs
the pages, the smell of
ink and sweated brow.

She holds it to her breasts,
near where her heart lies,
pushing it closer, wanting
to put it into her heart’s tick

and hold. Her first lover in
marriage, her husband
unaware, not guessing
why she blushed or her

hands shook. He talked
of business and Brinston’s
hunt and the need for
the hounds to be ready.

She sat sensing the paper
near her heart, tucked
between breasts, his words
burning their way into

her mind, gazing at her
husband’s jaw, his nose,
the way it slightly hooked
over his glass of wine.

Now standing by the tall
window she peers on to
the lawn, sees the roses,
the high hedges, the old

gardener rising and bowing
as he tended work. She
reads the letter once more,
mouthing the words like

a child new to learning,
a finger moving across
the page, the painted nail
touching. She looks across

to the nearby woods,
the beckoning darkness,
the place where she lay,
where he held her, kissed

her and in the shadowy
part gave herself in body
and held him to her heart.