The Gate

"By the squeaky old gate that tomorrow will find" A scarecrow debates with the rust of his mind, He’s stitched from the thoughts that the dreamers outgrew, Wearing boots full of echoes and logic askew, While time ties its laces with fragments of chance, And memory curtsies in yesterday’s dance. A teacup of thunder, left out on the sill, Hums songs to the rain with a whimsical will. It waits for a hand that remembers its glaze— The brushstroke of lovers, or half-written praise. A spoonful of silence stirs sugarless tea, Brewed strong in the absence of who we might be. "By the squeaky old gate that tomorrow will find" Lies a map of all places we’ve yet to unbind, Drawn in invisible ink from the mind’s other side, Where calendars melt and assumptions subside. Each hinge is a riddle, each post is a guess— A portal disguised in familiar duress. The gate never opens, the gate never shuts, It just creaks with the weight of the ifs and the buts. It’s watched generations hang keys they outgrew, And whisper their whens into skies fading blue. Still it stands like a question the past left unsigned— "By the squeaky old gate that tomorrow will find."