Faded Chinese Ballroom

Faded Chinese Ballroom
Outside, the garden
Flourishes under sunlight and humidity,
Well-tended and full of life.
A black butterfly flits past
On some inscrutable errand.
Fish glitter in the pond,
As shiny as the coins
Dropped there for luck or hope of luck.
Inside, the hall
Is filled with mold spores
By a rattling air conditioner
That chatters over a carpet past its prime.
Insects crawl in the curtains
In this ballroom past its prime.
Outside the men’s room,
A rice bug lies on its back,
kicking feebly: its battle it already lost.
The place is slowly being reclaimed
by the Earth.
Chairs,
Brightly colored in
Chinese sensibility,
Sink slowly back into the ground.
This is a place past its time.
Outside the window we can see
Disrepair reclaiming the roofs.
Inside, the paneling and crown molding are damaged.
Things are stained, shabby,
But full of bygone grace and elegance:
Cherubs who will never age
watch from their painted faces
on the doors.
It is a beautiful place,
An aging friend growing wrinkled
And scarred by time.
Perhaps it will be ploughed under soon,
Too old to be popular, but too young yet
For reverence and preservation.
Perhaps this place could be better cared for.
Perhaps some new paint,
Some effort with sandpaper and a hammer,
could reverse some of the entropy here.
But for now the entropy has its own beauty,
And the neglect is essentially benign.