What’s Left
by Kitty Jospé
Old house, barn silhouetted on the hill,
two empty chairs on the porch remain still.
You can barter the boards of the old battered barn
in its dust bowl days; spin alive its chattering yarn,
the 24/7 wait in the widow’s watch, now windowless crown;
as the moon out of thick cloud, falls on the exhausted home.
You can hear the ghosts whispering in the creak of the chairs
by the silvering light, descending the abandoned stairs
The house leaking, with the wind’s moan, and sagging—
the groaning wind through the broken boards flagging
under the strain of gathering the past, to make repair—
but only the ghosts speak the past’s presence there.
Note: The poem was inspired by these pictures my husband took on one of his many bike rides in poorer sections of Western New York State.
Kitty Jospé loves facilitating poetry appreciation and collaborations with word, art and music. After years of teaching French, she turned to English, and received her MFA in creative writing in 2009.
RUNDELANIA 