Danish postal service to stop delivering letters after 400 years,
The Guardian
I heard on the radio today that your rapier-thin
countenance may be fading and I fear the world
could lose your penned words that sing in traveling
duets with the personality of hands. I cherish my
mother’s purple ink that was the sap of her sugarcane
and my father’s cursive tenderness all those years
when he was away. What will happen to kisses
that survive your folds or sweet chicken scratches
that nest in your envelopes then continue their lives
in shoebox gardens? Should I begin mourning my
mail carrier whose glasses fog over with his goofy
punchlines? O Letter, don’t abandon us for the allure
of digital breath. Keep being our tiny parcel of memory,
transcriptions for the idiosyncratic artwork of our hearts.
Rikki Santer’s poetry collection, Resurrection Letter was grand prize short-listed for the Eric Hoffer Book Award and Shep-herd’s Hour, won the Paul Nemser Book Prize from Lily Poetry Review Books. In 2023, she was named Ohio Poet of the Year and currently serves as Artist-in-Residence at Fran Ryan Center in Columbus, Ohio.
