Lives Of The Hunger Artists

["This is my letter to the world"

-Emily Dickinson

"O Jerusalem, stoning the prophets,

how often I would have gathered...'

Jesus Christ

"This living hand, warm and capable"

-John Keats

I am sending you a last letter:

written on snow

by moonlight.

you do not answer

when I ask:

you do not

honor what I honor.

you leave thorns

instead of roses

thinking yourself a

charitable person

you let me starve;

then you expect a feast.

you leave me friendless

then demean my friendlessness to others.

and let me freeze

asking

"why is he/she shaking?"

I am writing this letter

like a bloodless revolution

like a smile, - a simile-

broken in two

by those who abandon with

no conscience

what others died for-

chasing all evictions down

rushing in to steal

whatever's left behind they can

carry off in truckloads

after I'm dead you'll build an

edifice of Criticism

and furnish it like Versailles;

you will live comfortably

pilfering old letters

first drafts scouring

earliest sketchbooks like

kitchenware

munching on the windfall apples

of ghost-written libels

so

here is your fair copy

with no envelope

like a night with no stars

a summer with no breeze

a Heaven with no God-

a gallery with no paintings O

Jerusalem, stoning and stoning

what you'll never understand

yet God Himself is

with me, His starry

hand on my right shoulder:

writing with me in invisible ink

this winter telegram to you O

Jerusalem I only wanted to

tell you how beautiful it could be-

to live

mary angela douglas 10 december 2009