21 May 2018:
I wonder if you’re still around, like your book says. It’s been six years since it was published—three since I read it.
The latest resources tell me you’re not around this valley anymore. They say maybe Illinois, some Franciscan University I’ll never see.
But when were you here? Or were you? And will you ever come back?
The magpies, they seem to say what you’d say.
*
Ash and spruce: this town is full of them. Ash and spruce, and bars.
When I drive the blank valley roads I think of your book, Things That Are. A strange book of simple wisdom, full of whoever you have been, wherever you have been.
Here’s what you wrote once: “The air is a question and those who travel upon it travel in questions: When will I find what? Where is who?”
Yes, Amy, I’ve hoped to run into you, though I don’t know what I’d ever say.
Isn’t campus pretty in the winter?
Or, aren’t the ducks funny?
Or, where did you go?
Writing from Here 