creeps in the door ajar
her heart
has been closed since
azaleas blanketed the mountain
misty morning
I open The Art of Loving
her letter
falls out
Dear John...
that starlit night
full of her promises...
a column of smoke
burning returned letters
I open our album
raining outside
I sit at a window
drinking coffee --
the youthful self walks into
the summer of 1967
Atlas Poetica, #8.
Note: The concluding tanka is anthologized in Take Five: Best Contemporary Tanka Vol. 3 (2010).