"Two wrongs may not make a right but a thousand wrongs make a writer.”

Wednesday, December 8, 2021

We No Longer Have To Take Off Our Shoes

Doors are left open and the cellar light on
b
ut nobody cares. Booted footsteps echo
t
hrough the empty house, like a burglar on the take
for we no longer have to take off our shoes

Bird at the window, a mirror breaks

broken glass swept into a corner—

seven years of sadness lie in wait

though we no longer have to take off our shoes.

 

Grandmother’s hand at my back as I climb up the stairs.

Drawers emptied of playsuits, notions, and books.

The railing wobbles under my hand as I climb down the stairs

to a kitchen emptied of aprons, lemon drops, extracts and pots.

Efficient emptying. There was no time for crying.

 

Crumbled brick from a sledge under the mantle he set

over the wood stove he filled till he could fill it no more.

The one loose brick that stubbed our toes

lies buried under a rubble we can no longer put back.

But we don’t have to take off our shoes.

 

Cut grass blown against the house clings

like barnacles to a hull, Birdfeeders are empty

and crows fill the trees.The maw from uprooted 

lavender is raw and wet.

Get over it, we’re told,

but the columbine and narcissus are fighting for air.

 

The rose climbs out of it, sturdy as a tree.

It holds on to the house (as old as the house),

roots embedded in the structure.

She trained it that way.

 

The purple body of a nestling

lies crumpled on the sidewalk

and a dead mouse is curled on the cellar stairs,

littered with windfall and careless debris.

 

The bewildered dog lies in the middle of the driveway

and a cat drinks from a puddle.

Hidden hostility punched a hall in the wall.

We no longer have to take off our shoes.



"Passions Stamped on Lifeless Things", so begins the prompt from dVerse  (the poets pub) for us poets and writers to focus on history. To write about any object, ship, house, building, or palace but with a link to history and the past. Notice the Stetson? Another story.



Thank you for reading and thank you Merril Smith at dVerse for enticing me to pull this one out of the archives.


20 comments:

forestbather said...

So much atmosphere, so well-crafted I feel I was there...the details gave the imagery, and time was tangible...a very good read.

Yvonne Osborne said...

Ain, Thank you.

Merril D. Smith said...

So well-written. I also felt like I was there. The repetition was very effective, and while I wasn't certain what had happened, there was definitely sadness and loss here. I felt for the dog. A poem to read over a few times, I think.

Ingrid said...

These kinds of wounds take so long to heal. I feel your hurt written into every line. I'm sorry for your loss.

Dora said...

So many wondrous lines and imagery ("columbine and narcissus fighting for air"), they fill up the drawers of our mind as surely and in exact proportion to what is emptied from the house, full of memories, full of "hidden hostility" and grief, the forlorn figure of the "bewildered dog lies in the middle of the driveway." A beautiful read, Yvonne.
Pax,
Dora

Yvonne Osborne said...


Merril,
Thank you so much and thanks for the prompt which had me digging up memories.

Ingrid,
Thank you. Some things are never forgotten.

Dora,
Thanks! I like "filling up the drawers of our mind". As relates to all that was emptied, perfetly put.

Anthony Duce said...

Wonderful. Brought back all the feelings and sorrow of similar times returning to empty places after the death of a loved one.

Millie said...

Very touching look into the past.

Teresa @ Razzamadazzle

Dwight L. Roth said...

Your poem is full of passionate memories of having lived in that house. It really is sad to see our home waste away. I had many of the same feelings when I visited my childhood home a few years ago. The repetition of not taking my shoes off really sets the memory tones back in time!

ms_lili said...

My take is this is your grandparents' home, they are gone now, and the building is being demolished. I like the organic framework you use, expanding the grief beyond yourself and to both animate and inanimate artifacts that have been sharing space in this what I would call home ecosystem. The sorrow is palpable. Such a well-done and poignant write.
ms_lili (aka Jade Li/Lisa)

calmkate said...

you took me there ... too sad but spoken like there has been some healing! So glad you no longer need to take your shoes off :)

Yvonne Osborne said...

Tony, Thank you

Millie, Thanks!

Dwight, Thank you. That house is gone now hauled away like a worthless ton of bricks.

Lilli,
Thanks. My parents, and their parents before. It's a sad thing to think about. I don't know why I keep going there when it's been so long gone

Kate,
Thank you

hedgewitch said...

Powerful writing, that can make a house and its people, present and gone, so real and full of memories. The refrain of the shoes is like a sad melody that runs behind the words, something so small gained from a loss so large, or so I read. Each detail brings out something that tells a story, though we may not know either its beginning or end. As a gardener I was struck by the "maw" left by pulled up lavender, so vivid I could see it, and the rose that owns the house more than the house owns it. Mysterious, oblique, and yet there is all that is needed here for the reader to feel what needs to be felt.

Yvonne Osborne said...

Hedgewitch,
Thank you very much! I'm glad you felt what needed to be felt. Sigh...thanks for your comment.
p.s. the rose was an old world climber planted by my grandma and we managed to dig enough of the root to give it a start elsewhere but it struggles. Just as we do.

paeansunplugged said...

The last line brings the finality forcefully...of what has gone. Very well expressed.

Yvonne Osborne said...

Paean Sun,
Hey, thanks!!

Rajani Rehana said...

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brudberg said...

I can really feel that house and its decay after its inhabitants left... I really love how you shifted the focus writing about the bricks he laid... this house was the people living there, and when they are gone so is the house.

Yvonne Osborne said...

Rajani,
Thanks!!

Brudberg,
Thank you. That's it: when the people were gone so went the house, in more ways than one. Only the memories remain.