Elegiac Letter To Catherine

You should have told me it was your last letter. Forgive me, sometimes
I fret. How could you have known? I read it everyday. Nobody writes
letters anymore. Yes, resign the presidency of the music committee

if it is too stressful. Maybe fewer cortisone shots will be needed
to relieve your bursitis. I suppose the house you inherited
is a mixed blessing, what with all the repairs and an octogenarian inside.

Is she the aunt who searched the Sinai for ancient manuscripts?
I've smashed and scooped the pulp of twenty pumpkins since your letter;
the muffin recipe still sates. Your script is still exquisite. Palmer would be proud.

Be thou perfect even as your Heavenly Father is perfect. In all things,
Catherine? You have always burned with the fire of a convert. No wonder
your brain burst. Even though you had such a short time together

without you George is as fragile as a wind-lashed lantern. At dusk
yesterday a phalanx of geese slipped across the lake in a perfect V.
I ramble. What was it I meant to ask? Oh, yes, did I leave

my leather gloves and wool scarf on your foyer table?