to my astral lover, whom I've never touched

thank you for your beautiful reflection about my letters, that i felt cloak around me like a kiss from god. it was i who had eaten the mushroom this time, a relatively small amount, earlier in the night. i’d come in from a fire and starlight to my rosy shell room feeling like a captainess as my guest slept on the couch, and listening to opera music received it, had tears warm and pure streaming down my face like some sort of religious relief, flush with the miracle of being seen. 

in that moment, i felt your words, the sentiment so clearly, got to be with them in this immediate way, like a ribbon dancing through me, what it means to exchange life. and of course the zoom out is there’s more to everything than just a sentence, than a few, that plot points stay mainly the same (in our case), and so to hold everything in context is important— yet what a blessing to feel, if just for a spell, such an acute level of connection. and remembering emily dickenson, whose primary intimacies were experienced this way, with fervor, through words. still i want skin, what are you going to do.