Sarah Carey
Letters Home
(for Dad on sabbatical)
You can't stop writing about the domes
At the Palace Church in Pushkin,
how the bulbs were built
to shed snow in winter.
I almost freeze when you tell me,
20 million war dead, feel the weight
of memories that won’t stop trying to rebuild.
Alone in Red Square
you spare no detail:
around you, St. Basil's,
now a state museum.
Inside, rare books losing their spines.
As usual, you have left the group
to spell this out to me
in your long hand, inviting me in,
and I hope I am not rewriting history
as I imagine you fortysomething years ago
in the county hospital, awaiting my delivery,
everything committed to recollection,
stories you would tell on holidays,
at anniversaries, to lovers,
to strangers, the particular weather,
whatever pain or fear you could recall
that was your own, whatever joy.
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Sarah Carey attended Duke University and Florida State University, from which she received a master of arts in English with a concentration in creative writing
(poetry) in 1981. She is an accomplished journalist and former weekly newspaper
editor with awards from the Florida Bar, the Florida Press Association, the
Florida Press Club and the Florida Medical Association. In 1987, she participated in the Warren Wilson College’s writing program as a residency-only student. In 2002 and in 2003 she attended the Key West Writers Workshop, where she studied on
both occasions with Carolyn Forche. An accredited public relations professional,
she also has amassed many awards from the Florida Public Relations Association
during the 14 years she has worked as director of public relations for the
University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine. Sarah Carey lives in
Gainesville, Fla. with her husband, Chad Hunsaker.
