— for Shirley Jackson
Shelved among the thirteen miles of boxes in the LOC —
protected now from light and migrant acids — stray lingins
and humidity — the outsized leather scrapbook in your archive
waits in air-conditioned darkness like an overwritten codex
or a clavicle of alchemy. On the cover, ripped and incomplete —
the folio you tore from The New Yorker, scissored, held in place
by glue — the strips of old adhesive tape applied to mend it
frail and ossified — as yellow as a witch’s teeth. Inside, affixed
with staples, paste, and rubber-based epoxies — all those letters
of displeasure, condemnation and abuse. “Outrageous,” “grim
and gruesome,” “a perversion of democracy.” Subscribers
in their hundreds asked if what you wrote was true. As if
they understood that blame and female sacrifice were things
they thought they recognized — things they thought they knew.