Another no-named missive
affects my correspondence, often in-coming,
less frequently out-going, as I tire of games,
but enjoy watching them nonetheless.
Every so often the talks shift from endless
repetitions of the holy name to pronouns,
simpler, reboxing the magic of the beloved's moniker--
or betraying a shift towards abstraction and detatchment
(finally, breathe recipients in relief).
Not a capital He, for that implies integrity/a deity,
or a completeness of the virtue of being extant;
Nor a he, careless and meaningless, given in words
on ordinary days in dull conversation.
The breathless he, engaged in thrilling word exchanges,
known only to the pert ear as darling,
the he spoken of in girlish secrets
among squeals, shushing, betraying smiles, laughing eyes,
the he at whose mention the boys' eyes roll.
What ought I lose by seeming silly? Indeed,
what to gain by being serious? the gigglers ask.
In the written word, he is spilled countless times,
often outrunning I; sometimes finding himself
in a completed schedule, sometimes a detailed account, tales,
perhaps strung up in disjointed anecdotes
from a year or three's acquaintence
pulled into freshness in letter-flushed retelling.
Poured into aching sentence structure,
cracking prose with his power,
but eventually dying like a rainshower
and ending often in a trickle of words
barely punctuated by the indifferent he of popular non-fiction.
Occasionally in nova-like injuries to the heart
or ego, he is spoken in lava-spitting
fistfulls of frustrated keyboard letters, giant inky tears,
or angry, incanted syllables improperly pronounced.
The radioactive pronoun is not touched by friends,
but is given the same respect as a deathly, contagious man.
It is amusing for me to reread letters sent and letters received,
noting beaux of friends in epistles mentioned,
watching the pronouns slip in over time.
I see a pattern in my own writings;
his name appears frequently, the original he,
where it may, doing damage everywhere it touches (eventually),
but liberally dosed in the beginning with joy.
As his name increases in potency,
he crops up, first with hope, later in pain and anger.
But as the power in his name dies with time,
so does the impact of the "he" on my work--and the quality suffers.
Henceforth it is difficult to tell the hes apart,
all lining up internally to be treated on miniature
the same as the initial, the most impressing of all.
His true name is no longer spoken,
the magic too strong, yet unremembered, hence not evokable.
For us all, the pronoun shields us from the one,
the original injury, the savior, the threat to our fragile selves,
perhaps the only people we will ever innocently love,
after whom those who, by importance, follow
only as shadows, pronouns themlselves
to the love whose power is best left dormat in memory.