The Living

Weathered brick taken with grass
fade into ground, work lost to earth,
stalks of Ironweed.
At the porch, only a ghostly border,
eighty years of landmark stone.

A propped door against the left wall,
just over threshold’s slat.

Evening sun fills the room.
Slight wind stirs musty scents;
water stains, dry-rot.
A wood-borer drones
deep in a beam.
Filaments drift down through the light.

That was my solace,
in cob-webs or sifting
murky atmospheres of dust and mold.
to see what was and is
in molecules of every living thing,
of all that’s made and suffered.

Wind draws over the porch
through apple leaves and orchard grass.
I walk fields where there is no path to follow
***