Letter to K.:

Winter is here and I am well, in the thick of it. I count trees through the window, bear witness to the mystery of refracting light, play songs on the record player. Where you are there is snow, sure, but here in New York we have between nine and 30 million people at any time, and no two are alike. So to answer your question, yes, it does get a little lonely. The subways are bright and crowded, or bright and empty. The bars are dark and what do those dark hours add up to anyway? They must go like pennies down a well along with all the conversations I don’t remember, afternoons of historic insignificance, times I rubbed against warm bodies just a little unlike mine. Winter means the furthest distance from the sun, and that means perspective -- so of course the nights can be a little cold; of course one might start to lose sight of the subtle differences, the nuances that so effectively sever Me from You and inflame the summer months with impossible longing… "I’ll concentrate on the exporting and you concentrate on the importing," a man says to a woman, his arm around her as they pass me in the street. What good advice for the winter! I hope where you are the needle scratches sweet sounds and the streets catch snow cascading from the sky like a lazy Rapunzel transforming the world into something so alien you can’t help but want it all, you can’t hold it close enough: like a stranger’s perfect body, perfectly out of reach.

-amr-