Letter to Anne from Kitsilano

Last night I dreamt about your family, like I sometimes do

when I’m feeling particularly far away from everything.

Days go by that I don’t speak a word and yet it’s fine,

somehow. I swim length after length at the pool,

where underwater everything is quieter still.

I’ve taken to writing more letters lately.

In part, I think, to remind myself that I’m here.

The sun is out and everyone in the city with it, happy

for as long as this lasts. Black-capped chickadees sing

outside my window like they do at home, that hey

sweetie song like a boomerang. They remind me of you

sneezing in the orchard grass, rubbing your nose so hard

I had to look away. Anne, did you know the moon was full

this February? A rarity. Visible at midday like a pinball, flickering.

It’s the first leap year since your grandmother’s death.

How fitting, someone said, that she should leave you only

one day every four years to grieve. How full she was, too.

The odd bird disrupts my thoughts, thinking my window

the sky. It’s raining again. Your brother said once

how he likes the weather in San Francisco, its predictability.

Here, the winter seems shorter than ever. The tulips

will soon be out, drunken, heavy-headed. Cats will needle

through the backyards to wail and the mailmen

will pull on their white shorts. Out east, you will

stop wearing mittens. We both know they won’t

all be good days, and somehow, that too is okay.