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THE NOTE

Elizabeth , in a long white dress,

Victorian style of her time,

red hair piled up

under a wide brimmed hat,

strolls in a formal garden.

She bends to look at a rose,

wanders farther on, and sits

on a bench in the shade

where she furls her parasol.

She takes a small book

from her cloth handbag, 

looks around to see

if anyone is watching her

read love poems.

A note falls from the cover,

“I know you have a romantic soul

and hope you mean

these poems for me

as I mean them for you.

J.”

She puts her gloved hand

to her mouth, horrified

that anyone knows

she reads such poems:

J? James? Jacque? Jack?

Then noticing wide loops in P’s and H’s --

Oh my, Jane? Did Jane know more

about her than she knew herself?

Elizabeth hurries to the house,

rummages in the library with its wall of books

stained glass lamp and brocade runner

down the heavy oak table,

and finds an inscription Jane wrote

to her mother. And, yes, there

are the same rounded loops.

The pulse of her sexuality,

alarms her, sends her searching

for Jane and holding out the note

could not refrain from kissing her.

“Oh my God,” said Jane,

“I am so embarrassed,

I thought I’d put that in Edward’s book.”