Letters from an Unfading Spring

To you, passing by the little shop,

This letter comes from a spring after 1994: a street with small shops, a denim patch, a narrow shop receipt. The envelope is sage-gray, and its title is the kind of big lettering a sign-painter does by hand, bold and warm, brushed stroke by stroke. Beside a soft pink plum branch a white egret papercut stands quietly. A blue patch printed like denim, a cream paper label with a price on it. Tradition and everyday life sit side by side, just like that.

More than a thousand years ago a poet had such a view outside his window: "Two orioles sing in the green willows; a line of white egrets climbs the blue sky. The window frames the snows of a thousand autumns on the western ridge; at the door are moored boats from Wu, ten thousand li away." — Du Fu, "Quatrain" (764)

Inside the window it is spring, and outside the snow; at the door lie boats that came from far, and letters that came from far. Welcome. Spring does not fade, and neither will a letter; read slowly, and we will wait slowly for your reply.

Spring was passing and asked after you

Storm Post Office

After 1994 · One early spring