The Slowness of the Post

Once again, it's National Poetry Month here in the States.  (Do I have any international readers?  Actually, do I have any readers?  Sometimes it's hard to tell, hint hint.)

I can't just be posting old ones, though, so this one is kind of new.  I started this and had the opening quatrain and the ending couplet a couple of years ago, but then gave it up.  This is my rather indifferent attempt, I'm afraid, at filling up the inside.  Don't worry, I'm not giving up my day job; I like that one a bit too much.

[EDIT: And I just noticed that this poem has extra bonus enjambment.  So, umm, yeah.]

the slowness of the post

When lovers in years past took quill in hand
to add to their epistolary chain
the latest, best-wrought link, they might complain
about the slowness of the post.  They planned
their thoughts for days, while trains traversed the land
with bundled hearts and holes, delayed by rain,
or frailty, or the smugness of the sane.
(But, yes, this did make love more tragic.)  And
now, though we write in liquid crystals, though
we fancy we eliminate the tragic,
anticipation, overnight, is no
less puzzling, no less vexing—no less magic.
    Look to the sky—yes, look, her answer, soon—
    look for it ere the waning of the Moon!

Copyright © 2013 Brian Tung