Every Letter Was A Love Letter.

Bubble Gum Angels Swooped From Top Margins Or Scraped Their Wings Between Teeming Paragraphs, Maidens With Golden Hair Dripped Sea Blue Tears Into The Books Spine, Grape-colored Whales Spouted Blood Around A Newspaper Item (pasted In) Listing Arrivals To The Endangered Spieces List. Six Hatchlings Cried From Shattered Shells Near An Entry Made On Easter. Cecilia Had Filled The Pages With A Profusion Of Colors And Curlicues, Candyland Ladders And Striped Shamrocks.

You Used To Be Able To Tell A Person's Nationality By The Face. Immigration Ended That. Next You Discerned Nationality Via The Footwear. Globalization Ended That.

The Window Gave Onto A View Of Dove-gray Roofs And Balconies, Each One Containing The Same Cracked Flowerpot And Sleeping Feline. It Was As If The Entire City Of Paris Had Agreed To Abide By A Single Understated Taste. Each Neighbor Was Doing His Or Her Own To Keep Up Standards, Which Was Difficult Because The French Ideal Wasn't Clearly Delineated Like The Neatness And Greenness Of American Lawns, But More Of A Picturesque Disrepair. It Took Courage To Let Things Fall Apart So Beautifully.

I'd Like To Have A Word For 'the Sadness Inspired By Failing Restaurants' As Well As For 'the Excitement Of Getting A Room With A Minibar.

Added To Their Loveliness Was A New Mysterious Suffering, Perfectly Silent, Visible In The Blue Puffiness Beneath Their Eyes Or The Way They Would Sometimes Stop In Mid-stride, Look Down, And Shake Their Heads As Though Disagreeing With Life.