“To write words I put a symbol in place of an absent sound. To write the words ‘I love you’ requires a further, analogous replacement, one that is much more painful in its implication. Your absence from the syntax of my life is not a fact to be changed by written words.”
– Anne Carson

Day 2:

My love Lalezaar, it is July and the tulips have come and gone. In their stead are roses. Brave and still vulnerable – like you – they bloom and dot the gardens with specks of pink. The water here sings. The air is clear and softens the skin. My arms are browner, my eyes are bright, my heart yearns for you at every street corner. You will call me fanciful and foolish, and I will think you are right.

No matter where I roam I leave my heart with you. Please – do not give it back.