but a shell
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ghosts …
peek every corner
these walls were the vessel of a family -
the body of a progenic spirit that
inhabited these bones of wood and
plaster and glass … and hope
for nearly four tens of years …
a blood of intent and care
coursed these walls -
surging with amity and loving instruction
it’s familial marrow warmed by two
happy and humble hearts that
thrummed sweet for all who tumbled
weary across its threshold
or saw its welcoming glimmer in
the depths of night
heralding them home …
these doors, now shut and silent,
once spread their arms wide in consanguinity
embracing each soul as their own
and whispering every ear
with cordiality … and accommodation
but …
just as our flesh is the repository of
the incorporeal -
the true essence of what defines
each of us
and carries on long after the
bones and body have come to dust,
so is this beloved structure but a shell …
the hearts that found comfort here -
that sang and wept and worked …
that spun their dreams and mended wounds …
that loved and laughed and argued …
that shared pain and lauded joys …
that buoyed life and railed at death
and ever found kindness to be their preferred enterprise …
those pulses will go on
long after this abode has come to ruination
for these rooms and roofs and ramparts
are but a house
yet the spirits that once moved here -
that found joy in one-another -
THEY were the true home
and those divine beings we carry
with us always
bound by the only force that
transcends time …
love.
Copyright © September 19, 2024 Gregory Richard Barden
Copyright © Gregory Richard Barden | Year Posted 2024
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