Love Letters

#L

How your fragrance and love 

Ooze out as I unfold

 Each carefully pressed layer

Of your tattered letters.

As my shaky fingers smoothen out 

Each wrinkled word, phrase  and line,

I regale moments shared.

Magically you appear, as if to 

Speak to me, in absentia:

Oh ’twere that I could fold you into my arms!

Alas, ’tis a pity that it is not to be so!

My eyes are tear-filled:

Each tear blots the inky pigment,

That speaks of your eyes 

That were pools in which I dared drown.

And now I drown in your words,

They’re my pool of solace.

How can then I rip these yellowed sheets apart

In which you lay?  In your words–smiles, tears,

Angst and pain is nestled a memory

Of years before the clock stopped.

Momentarily my tears are abated 

By your passionate billet doux,

strung together. How I wait for the day

When I know gnawing pain no more.

*****

© Mumtaz N Khorakiwala

18-1-2021

Picture courtesy: Joanna Kosinska

Unsplash.com