Poetry

Helen

The house fills

ever more quickly

with the detritus of distant selves.

Photographs betraying visions

of naked bodies and cannabis fumes;

spilling into the neglected living room

the paraphernalia of youth

that you long ago banished

to swamp in sedimentary turf

below the papers, dust mites, and cramp.

No one climbs willingly into

a confusion of knots

trading integrity for like not love

books for blinkers

as you resign yourself to the post office queue

punctuating the boxed neatness of routine

with a literary quote or two

perhaps in some wistful other-life,

where the bawling adoration of children booms louder still

than the scabrous stutter of self-doubt

you’d lift your hands to the sky,

fingers loosening the proverbial coil

and marvel at the fluidity of air.

Laura Fensterheim

© 2014