“I met Ivan in a marvelous foxfur coat,
his luxurious squalor, and wished you one … your grizzled
knob rising from the grizzled foxfur collar.
I long to laugh with you, gossip, catch up … or down;
and you will be pleased with Harriet,
in the last six months she’s stopped being a child,
she says God is just another great man,
an ape with grizzled sideburns in a cage.
Will you go with us to The Messiah,
on December 17th, a Thursday,
and eat at the Russian Tearoom afterward?
You’re not under inspection, just missed.…
I wait for your letters, tremble when I get none,
more when I do. Nothing new to say.”