Dear Mr. Selznick (Kaleidoscope)
Summary
Dear Mr. Selznick
Dear Mr. Selznick,
I read your new book on a Thursday
When the air was tense
With the wait for the end of May.
When I opened the book,
The words greeted me awkwardly
Because I had not read in two years.
Two years of staring at half faces
Hidden behind cloth and warnings
And looking past strangers’ gazes.
Two years of feeling unknown
Of nights waiting for a dull morning
Always dreaming of birds never flown.
I had not read in two years
But the words embraced me all the same,
Like I deserved it,
Like I deserved to be reassured.
Dear Mr. Selznick,
I read the first page
And there was a rush of relief.
“It’s not just me,” I thought,
Who feels like they are about to burst
into an explosion of stories and sounds and smiles,
A kaleidoscope spilled onto the floor.
Picked out from the mess of memories is a vile thing
Dull, gray, and seething,
Bundled with tape and string.
It is my grief in all its ugly, sad glory,
And this book placed it in my hand without warning.
Dear Mr. Selznick,
The James I know
Was my aunt.
She was the second mother I had
And the first mother I lost.
She would’ve loved your book
And would’ve criticized it the way only old aunts can.
She would’ve said “It’s too confusing”, “
And I would’ve laughed and explained the book badly.
But I lost her, so I know how to describe
That feeling of missing something too madly.
Dear Mr. Selznick,
I don’t know why you wrote this book,
And you don’t know why I wrote this poem,
But all 7 billion of us know of the days in a familiar room,
That slowly rotted into a familiar purgatory.
Simply waiting in the gloom,
Simply breathing in the stale air and rubbing alcohol.
The book is a dream
Filled with grand butterflies and conniving dragons
Towering stone castles and squat red apples,
And the world feels like a kaleidoscope
Fractured pieces of home and love
Twisted by distances and coughs and death
Arranged by an unsteady hand
Who is unsure
if they’re crafting their magnum opus
Or a beautiful nightmare.
(Maybe they’re the same thing.)
Dear Mr. Selznick,
Your book ruined me,
And put me back together again,
So I don’t know
Whether to be thankful or be angry,
Because your book forced me to stare
Into the eyes of my mind as it said
Look at me.
Look at what you’ve become.
Look at what you were.
Are you ashamed?
Are you proud?
I don’t know,
I don’t know.
If I broke myself open
I would see a kaleidoscope of anger and confusion and hope
The glass shards would be sharp and cold
With teenage rebellion
And exhausted complacency.
The colorful gems would gleam with ambition,
The shapes would be bizarre and wild,
Blazing with the future’s brightness.
Beneath it all,
I would see a heavy stone
Sanded smooth by time,
Yet weighed by all the memories.
In the end, I think that’s what grief is-
you could cover it all up,
all your sorrow and despair,
with everything you have now,
but it still sits there,
as unrelenting as back then.
Dear Mr. Selznick,
I understood few of your chapters,
But I understood every feeling.
Thank you,
for putting what is undescribable
Into words that say so much.
Your book deserves an award.
It reminds us
of the long-forgotten pain we have ignored.
Sincerely,
Carmel C.