Sarah Ann Winn
Arizona
Hey. Flagstaff tells me you still have my canyon.
Her observatory can see it stashed all the way back, behind the reservation. Don’t pretend it’s been lost. Keep your flat-chested highways, stretching without variation. I don’t need ticket stubs from Sedona or the desert dust from under saguaros, obviously your favorites. They look like they’re always being held up.
You can have your t-shirt back, butter-soft, light, salmon with the ancient painting on the rock wall. I slept in it all this time. Also take back your jalopies and tourist traps.
As a gesture of good faith, I’m returning the silver mine you gave me, engraved with years of scraping out towns named Jerome and Bumble Bee, which were not all I thought they’d be. I can hear you explain when I finally broke down: Nobody can get to the heart of something so empty. I drove six miles down switch-backed rock face, which ended early in a wash.
I should never have gone your way.
