Sadness

Lucille Clifton, you will be missed. You were truly an amazing voice in American poetry, and you have had a great influence on me. I will always be grateful I had the chance to see you read. Maybe in another life I'll get to ask you about that fox.

Open Letter to the woman who flicked her cigarette ashes on me at a bus stop in France. Twice.

I understand that smoking is to France kind of like what eating at McDonald’s is to America. Bad habit in the country, yes. Stereotypical behavior of its people, yes. Unbelievably common nationwide, yes. So it was no surprise to me that you were smoking at the bus stop the other day. What surprised me was the way you so inconsiderately let your cigarette ashes find their way onto my coat. My only coat. The first time I could, of course, let slide. You were standing next to me at such proximity and such an angle that, when the wind blew at just the speed and in just the direction that it happened to blow that day, your ash was clearly going to go nowhere but my coat. No big deal. It couldn’t have been helped. But I’m sure that you saw the way my eyes followed that ash, the way my left hand lifted to brush it from my right arm, and the way my eyes then looked up to meet yours. I know you saw it, because you looked away from me right away. And it was the type of look-away that means oh, my bad. I don’t care that you didn’t say you were sorry. You probably weren’t really sorry. But couldn’t you have just turned ever so slightly or switched smoking hands so that next time the wind blew your ash would have landed in the nearby fountain or in the street? No, I guess that would have been too difficult a task. But in all honesty, I’m not upset about that at all. I’m not upset that your ash landed a second time in the exact same spot on my coat. What really bugs me is the look you gave me. You know, the one you threw in my direction after I stood up – without saying anything, without even looking at you angrily as I so would have liked to do – and walked over to the next bench. You turned and tossed me such an annoyed glare that I had to ask myself if I had done something wrong by choosing to relocate to an ash-free, cigarette smell-free area. Well, dear woman who flicked her cigarette ash on me twice, please accept my sincerest apologies. I certainly didn’t mean to offend you. In hindsight, maybe you would have felt better about the whole situation had I rested there at that bus stop, your personal ashtray. And I’m most sorry that I can’t ever express this to you. Seeing as how a) I don’t usually understand the phenomenon in my mother tongue and b) I’m not yet fluent in yours, I truly doubt that I will be mastering sarcasm in this country anytime soon.

Letter to Morgan Freeman

Dear Morgan Freeman,

I truly hope you recover soon from your accident on Sunday. You are one of my favorite actors, and I can't imagine a Hollywood without you. Speedy Recovery, please.

Deepest regards,
Ashley

Dear Lucille Clifton,

Thank you so much for not disappointing. Last night was the first time I saw you in person, and you were incredible. Of course your soft-spoken poetry was fantastic, especially the new ones you wrote about Aunt Jamima and Cream of Wheat.

And when you read "Fury", after you told the story of your mother, it was so beautiful and sad that I cried real tears on my cheeks and hoped Sharon and Chris wouldn't see.

But perhaps more wonderful than your reading was the question and answer section. Because most of the questions were not questions but praise or reminders of familiarity. Like, "Lucille, I wanted to thank you for reading. I didn't know who you were before tonight but my girlfriend made me come and... and...I love you."

Then there was the man a few seats to my left who was more eager to be called on than anyone:

Man: Lucille?
You: Yes.
Man: I baby sat your kids. All six of them. My wife and I (motions to his wife).
You (after a few beats): Beth? Steve- no not Steve. What is your name? I'm so sorry.
Man: Roger.
You: Oh my! Did you know that (insert oldest's name here) is forty-seven years old? And (two more children) have passed.
Man: I know. We were sorry to hear that.
You: How's your brother? (To audience) Oh, excuse us.

I wanted to ask you about the fox that appears in so many of your poems. You write so beautifully of her, and I wanted to know what her inspiration is, and what she means to you, but I didn't have the guts to raise my hand.

Oh, I thought about asking you at the book signing table, but I thought I would rather use my time to have you sign my favorite poem "Song at Midnight" instead. Remember when I told you that that poem speaks to me, and you gave me some very wise words about men? Well, you were so soft-spoken that I didn't hear everything you said, and I figured the fox answer would be lost the same way if I asked it.

I'm sad that I didn't hear all of your advice about men, but if I'd asked you about the foxes and missed your answer, well I don't know if I could handle that.