Cardboard Crack
An open letter to Magic: The Gathering, product of Wizards of the Coast LLC.
Dear, MTG, I apologize for the paucity of our correspondence.
High school brings its suite of obligations, but there is no excuse for silence between friends.
I saw you briefly in the window of where we used to meet:
You look as dazzling as ever, your holographic laminate gleaming within a cold, glass display case.
And I must admit I lingered. Checked my phone even, to see what new projects you've endeavored upon.
But we both remember how things ended.
And although I don't intend to crack old wounds
(we both know your blue ink stains),
I write this more for myself, and the friends whom you've enraptured, than for you.
You infested me, little bug.
For you know well the furor of the bitten.
Ecstatic.
Elated.
Devoted to your research: spellbound by dreams of mastery, unaware as to who held the volition reins.
A student alone at Minamo, busted as Tolaria, barren as Sea Gate.
You left me,
Scarred as Mirrodin.
Happily pick-pocketed, for how do you and money differ but in your faces?
Value is an agreement, and you, my icy manipulator.
But I woke up. My heart now blighted where once was darksteel,
As your meager requests turned tens to twenties, merry to moxen.
Consider the rest my gifts ungiven.
You've found new company in the hands of my classmates since Thanksgiving.
I'm glad. Grateful even, though I spit ichor, half-jealous of your newfound honeymoon.
Another one bitten (your fangs renewed with Innistrad).
But I've found new love too, more Vocal, more Animated.
Perhaps we'll double date,
You and Martín,
With Me and Hearthstone.
Sincerely,
Russell Fairbanks