The Old Barn of Memories

I trudged along the crumbly dirt road

toward the old barn, decaying slowly with age as wild animals moved in,

making homes for themselves in the holey walls that had been made by the termites.

It appeared haunted,

with shabby rafters and broken windows and cobwebs galore,

bursting with old memories of getting his Saint Bernard from the distant past,

The pain of his loss is ripping deep,

Deep

Deep

Deep,

deep into my soul, yanking my loved ones away.

When I stood before the side of the old barn,

it towered high up into the sky with no sign of stopping.

The peeling of the bright red paint dribbled like blood,

down the side of the old barn, reminding me of all the blood,

all the blood that had been lost from my bloodline.

I remember how he loved to swing on the tire swing that hung from the rafters,

of the barn.  

I opened the door of the old barn to go inside.

Whatever is in the barn I fear to view with my two eyes, for fear

that my eyes will mourn the loss of the happiness which has

long been gone from this forsaken place.

The sound of his laughter echoed through the hallowed walls,

as I stood by the opened door and listened.

A crow with it’s deathly black feathers slicked back,

cawed a caw that was blacker than the darkest evil.

The suffocating stench, of the rotten carcass that the crow had been feasting on,

reeked with death. The emptiness that I felt I longed for the crow

to feel as well, because I did not want to be in my suffering,

alone, where I had been for the past couple of decades,

feeling sorry for myself. The old plaid jacket he got for his birthday,

when he came of age, was filthy from the mud and dirt he played in as a boy.

It was draped over an overturned wheelbarrow,

which had been flipped from our last fight.

Our last words exchanged,

were of anger instead of love.

My tears are salty against my tongue,

I feel bitterness instead of happiness,

I have lost everything and gained nothing.