Is there anything more exciting (and daunting) than an unopened envelope?

This week, poet and artist Frieda Hughes spent hours writing out invitations to her upcoming art exhibitions in London and Wales

ENVELOPE

With real hardcopy folded into it

There is a responsibility for an outcome.

It may contain weighted down sorrows

Or the news of a birth or engagement,

Your impending job loss,

Or the offer of a place at Oxford or Cambridge,

A job at the cafe on the corner, or an expedition

To somewhere the condensation drips from the cliffs

And baboons moon from the branches

Of trees you don’t recognise.

To its many destinations this envelope

Contains a warning of colour and sheep on hillsides,

And hibiscus flowers burning their brights

Through the laminate surface.

This envelope does not contain

An invitation to the funeral I shall attend tomorrow,

Or to a book launch for something I’ve not yet written.

This envelope is the one that I wrote for you, containing entry

To the October world inside my head,

And I hope you can come.