You are the verse I read

Here is a confession, I haven’t read the letters and verses you lent to me. Instead, I was reading you. I read, for instance, the note scribbled at the beginning of the book. There is a word struck out at the beginning of line four. Did that make you chuckle like it made me? The writer of the note signed off with his name but got the date wrong, I suppose. ‘Silly, adorable goof,’ did you say between a laugh? I noticed you have dog-eared pages three and five. I read them twice, hoping the words would stun me with the revelations they unraveled to you. Was it the poet’s angst at wanting to walk down a course far removed from what the world had saddled him up for? Or was it the perceptive discourse on what it is that a writer should write about, or should he write at all? Did it reveal an answer you were seeking? Or did the sheer force of the argument make you stop and think?

There is also a page that is torn ever so slightly. Maybe that happened one night when you fell asleep with the book open on your chest, and drugged thoughts of a young poet. Or maybe you mulled over a few lines for so long you didn’t realize you’d been clipping the page with your fingernails all along. On the last page, you’ve scribbled a verse. Is that yours? I spent several minutes looking at it, half amused at the carelessly thrown ellipsis. I agonized for long over the garbled first word of the last line. A lot hinged, and hinges still, on what I think it is. So I hope you won’t ever tell me what it is.

As I get to the end of this book, I realize I might have to revisit it someday to truly appreciate the poet’s work. My apologies, dear poet, for I was reading her in your words. I may have read her all wrong, but I’m just a reader after all.