A pyramid of dirty cups rises silently from the sink. A discussion next door becomes strident. My computer screen is ablaze. The luminous streetlights fail to cheer me.

10:32 PM on a Wednesday in January, three weeks to Valentine's Day, and I feel spiky like a hedgehog, bristly and attenuated. The last of the holiday cheer had evaporated this Sunday past when I paid a neighbor boy $5 to haul the Tannenbaum corpse to the curb. My "thank you" sounded foreign to our ears; they were the first gracious words I'd volunteered to someone else this year.

You are three states above and one time zone ahead of me. Right now, you are spooned against a woman who has adopted you, your frailties and your cruelty, where I could barely manage yours in foster care. It's 40 degrees colder where you are, and the chill in my bones reminds me you are the lucky one.

Where you are the moon shines down upon the snowy mountains, through the icicles that line your roof, and into your window. It highlights the paleness of your skin and the frosty line of your mouth as my name wafts through your dreams. Where I am, Luna has already ridden the dusk past the horizon. The low hanging clouds wait for me to fall asleep. They will keen for you when I cannot.

tonite the moon is

veiled in seven layers

of cloud - the same

number of sorrows you used

to shackle my heart to yours

All work is copyrighted property of Marie Lecrivain.