Sylvia,

 

I never knew you

But I feel like I did.

They never knew you, either

And they feel the same.

The difference is that

They're wrong.

 

They’ve looked in cold, four-cornered mirrors

And they’ve seen only themselves.

You and I have seen so much more

Than the speckled walls of that confined world

 

I know not precisely when you lived

Nor when you died

But I know that you and I,

We lived the sort of lives that are

The same.

 

They blame you, you see

For everything you wrote.

 

They don't know

What it is to be you

Or to be me.

They don't know that we never ordered the bee box.

It arrived on our doorsteps with the post

On the days we were born.

 

She brought it

 

We received many boxes.

You didn't know what was inside, though,

Did you?

I didn't.

It was always a surprise with you and me.

 

She brought it

Upon herself

 

They can't understand

What it is to be

The way we were.

The ugliness, the uncontrollable ugliness

And the hatred, the unbelievable hatred

Wrestling with us

In our very own minds.

 

She chose

 

They blame us, you see

For everything we think.

 

They don't realize

That it controls us

And we don't control it

They don't know that Kindness is cruel

They can’t know, not like we know.

 

She chose

This

 

How I wish I could tell you all the things you needed to hear,

All the things I heard

That kept me from your fate.

 

The flowers were ending their lives

 

How I wish I could show you

The beauty in being

Vertical

All the hows and if onlys and what ifs and buts and ands

Do us, the goldfish, and the rabbits no good now, do they?

 

The flowers were ending their lives

Just like

 

I know the weight of the world

As I, too, have carried it

With one hand, the other forcing a pen

Across the page

Hoping that some desperate, tired soul will read these words

Before they become me

And you.

But I want you to know

 

The flowers were ending their lives

Just like

She ended hers.

 

You were always useful.

 

With love,

A friend