For Carl Dennis

From 1974 to 2004

you wrote in some bright room

that I never saw the light of.

Thirty years. So much of my

lifespan spent with your fingers

in ink and I never read

a word of it.

Not even today in the library

when I ran my fingers down

the spine of your dust

jacket and then walked

out the door.

I know

I am ungrateful not

to give you my time.

A few odd hours in

recompense for a

whole life of

work

But it comforts me enough

to think that you're out there:

you and others like you

rubbing sleep from aging

eyes just trying to say

something. To think

that after all

of those pages,

one of you is bound

to have hit on something

that will save me, something I

just haven't got around to reading yet.