The Cosmic Suite, 1987

To you, with your head tilted back,

This letter is from 1987, from the north of the Soviet Union, near the space facilities around Plesetsk. The sky is teal-blue and silver, and so cold that you can hear the snow squeak underfoot. The envelope is navy, with spacious orbital-geometric capitals for the English title. A pale teal mission diagram has been drawn with great precision, yet beside it a burgundy circus ring circles a tiny acrobat walking right along the orbit. The cream instrument docket and the gold planet stamp are printed on paper, the ink faintly gleaming in the cold light.

A poet, walking alone at night, once saw the same thing: "The night is still. The desert listens to God, and star speaks to star." — Mikhail Lermontov, "I Walk Out Alone onto the Road" (1841)

The cosmos is large and the suite is long; we only mean to leave you one small movement, a quiet one, which you can begin hearing from anywhere. Welcome. Read slowly, write slowly, and the rain will keep the beat.

With the stars as witness

Storm Post Office

1987 · Plesetsk