For What Remains

1941

2010

I touch things

like the child I was,

all the familiar things

that kept me safe.

Depression salvage -

handled, used, re-used, 

stained, rusted -

tended and brought to the present.

Sacks of memories -

fragmented histories

stacked neatly in liquor boxes -

The apron she was wearing

when she caught me at the bottom

of the basement stairs -

The crystal stemware

that sang with

moistened fingers -

The meaning of things

altered

like her mind.

Walls hold the plot

of our lives;

stand blameless

like change.

I sweep the floor

to clear the effort it took

to place her, replace this -

With a gentler fate.

© 2010 by Kathryn Feigal. All rights reserved.