Finding My Way Home

In retrospect this starry night,  
I settle, drifting mentally    
To take a sentimental flight    
Through old mementos’ fam’ily.    
   
Binoculars to where we’d go    
When I was hardly big at all.    
We’d visit mother’s great-Aunt Ro'    
Who lived a few yards from the pier    
Where I would play when we would call.    
   
A wooden stairway, painted white    
With rails that lead up to the house.    
An open porch, airy and bright;    
She kept the ashes of her spouse.    
   
Built long before the nineteen-tens;    
The screen door always creaked back when.    
She’d greet us in a floral frock    
The last time that we saw her then.    
   
While on the rug I’d fond recall    
The rooms were dimly lit within,    
The music heard from down the hall,    
And always kept neat as a pin.    
   
Where seagull shades had always flown    
From light thru’ stained glass window panes.    
The polished floors and ceilings shone    
Throughout the seaside bungalow.    
   
The parlor with its faded grace    
For me, the very best of all.    
The youthful glee upon my face,    
Wide-eyed, and still so very small.    
   
Through beveled cabinets of glass,    
Though I was tall enough to look    
And see the treasures on display    
That laid among the leather books.    
   
The china doll with bee-stung lips,    
And silky finger-wave of curl.    
A child-sized portrait of the world,    
Of clothes & doll house furniture.    
   
A crystal perfume bottle set    
Still holding rosewater remnants,    
Of parties, plays and dinner show.    
A pressed corsage from long ago.    
   
A medal, and some ribbons, too    
Were laid by her son's baby shoes;    
The one who wore them years before    
He died; the war to end all wars.    
   
Hand-drawn & painted souvenirs    
From Rio, Rome and olde Tangiers.    
Then from the roof I heard rain fall,    
The tumbledown of thunder's squall.    
     
The breakers soon would churn the beach,    
And drown the music out of reach,    
I couldn’t hear it anymore—    
The gulls had all flown into shore.    
   
Now once the shades had all been drawn,    
Great-Auntie's careworn hands were gone.    
   
And by the morning from my bed,    
Among the pile of dreams I took,    
A faded note slid from a book    
Of which I opened, and it said:    
   
“Only mem’ries are meant to last.    
You aren’t meant to stay in the past.”.
 
 
 
#heritage