Self-Indulgence

I'm working on this new poem - this is my first draft, after several rough drafts. My process is to write it out long-hand several times over, modifying it until I feel it is "done" enough to bother typing. How do I know when it's ready? I don't mind reading it. I worry that this poem is a bit inaccessible. I showed it to my friend Brian and he seemed to feel it was a bit hard to enter. I don't mind this - it's a hard balance for me to strike, saying what I want to say, how I want to say it, but also allowing some of it to get through to the reader. I don't want to play to an audience, but it would be nice if they caught my general gist.

I think it needs to be expanded outward. There's more to say, although I'm tempted to let it be for a while.

Letterhead

Should we call me a cat’s toy or
tired mouse? That’s not quite
it – a double-breasted bauble
a mailbox slit rammed with
letters, outgoing notes unread. We
won’t extend one finger,
unfurl a knuckle inside the crease
split a jagged line – not for old
time’s sake or even a bubble of gas,
a laugh. We, flurry of loose’d pages
a sigh, leaves that never hit
the ground. We boats sink
paper melts from our mouth.
We are the page, slicing
each pad of the fingers I own.
I the whole hand, cup
at the sea, open.