Dear New World,

Life here is perhaps as you remember. Garlic cloves
are still nailed above Grandmother's sick bed, both
equally dried and pungent. The youngest is still given
to fits, gabbling in the darkness of the coal cellar,
a belt cinched around his head. Inquiries have been
made to the lay brothers regarding a future position
for him within the Order.

Yes, life is mostly the same: little changes, and
change is little. The Laird still rides to the hounds,
marauding fox, fen, and convent alike. Gypsy caravans
still shelter in the forest, tinkering copper pots and
causing an abundance of runaways and two-headed
calves. The poets, as usual, drape themselves across
the gravestones, mewing flirtatious threats towards
their intended.

Yes, yes, and yes, there are still dragons, bears and
boars. Pestilence, Death, and Pride, as always, walk
upon two legs. During the rainy years, saints and
devils crop up alongside the ergot. Drafty chinks in
the wattle are stopped up with dung, and, of course,
there's never a shortage of drafts or dung.

Yes, there are still witches, idiots, cudgels,
infidels, St. Vitus' dance, and maypoles. The Blind
still lead the Naked, a one-eyed King rules both, and
all eat blackbird pie.

Don't laugh, New World. Tradition is capable of
crossing any ocean, and here, such lessons are still
taken seriously.

Sincerely,

The Old World

A finalist for the 2003 Erskine J. Poetry Prize, Tobias Seamon's work has appeared/is forthcoming at such places as The Mississippi Review, The Pedestal Magazine, Smartish Pace, and Strange Horizons, with his novel The Magician's Study forthcoming in 2004 from Turtle Point Press. He lives in Albany, NY. To contact him, email trowsea@yahoo.com.