Having Entered through the exit, she had

in essence assured that the ending

was going to read much more

differently and so it did. Oh it did.

Work and Words by: Melissa Nelson

Riverview Station, Studio #314, 191 Lyman Street, Ashville NC [828]-707-6845

I’ve told my husband that I wish Elizabeth Barrett Browning hadn’t written “How do I love thee,” because I would have really liked being the one to have written it to him. He told me to just start writing.

My Christmas gift for Jose was

a piece of sculpture that I had seen,

was drawn into,

read the poem engraved within it

(during Melissa’s clay working process),

and had my breath taken away by the words (above).

It was he (Jose) emerging, he that had come into my life

and has made it read much more differently.

We shared a glass of “J” bubbly

and now the moment is set in stone.