Awashima - 漂流郵便局

Awashima - 漂流郵便局
[Hyōryū Yūbinkyoku]
(Missing Post Office)

I write
so that this paper
stops drifting
inside me.

Here the sea brushes the coasts
smoky with burnt leaves,
pressing against the rocks
like an arm damp with dew
beneath a sky almost asleep.

I have written smoky words.
They have soaked the rice papers
with red ink,
light as crane feathers
and heavy as what I never said.

Your scent rises
from the roaring beach.
It enters my body, shaking it.
My back arches like a bow,
not to yield,
but to remember that it could.

The surrender it grants
lasts two wingbeats
on the horizon.

I write
to separate from you.
I write
to draw closer.
I write
to give in.
I write
not to come searching for you.

If one day
these words reach you,
perhaps I will already be elsewhere.

You will remain.
Adrift.
From the grasp of my fingers
entwined with yours.

Not mine.
Like the sea
that touches
and withdraws.

#awashima
— Hyōryū Yūbinkyoku
#loveletters #englishcontemporarypoetry
#missingpostoffice #neverendinglove