A forgotten letter to the Steppenwolverine

I actually don't know how it happened, but today I discovered a forgotten email to me from Norman, dated 7th June 2012. Here it is. (His pet name for me was 'Wolverine' - short for 'Steppenwolverine', a feminisation of Steppenwolf, which Norman called himself after Herman Hesse's figure of that name to express his isolatedness.)

My Dearest Wolverine,

    As someone who's been called

    a Master of Fire,*

    your log-blooms awe me,

    their architecure

    so sure,

    so

    alert to the meaning of air-paths

    traced amidst the symmetries

    and crankinesses of wood;

    and these past days

    you have set me to sleep and meditate

    before such heart-warm blazes

    that today some ache in my chest that's been there as long as I can recall

    gave way,

    let me settle towards a peace of mind and body

    I've not known for years

    - took me into the arms of comfort

    that are your flesh and spirit

    laving over me,

    healing me

    of a life-long illness,

    letting me come safely into your company

    more closely than anyone's

    ever done before,

    thawing my self-denying fear of risking living

    into trickling

    like the first seeps of Spring

    towards

    really leafing

    into Tomorrow.

    Love,

            Norman.

* My poem Master of Creation, which describes Norman as a master of fire, was published in New Contrast 152, Vol.38, No.4, Summer 2010.