Molasses

poetry

This year my son’s grandfather had already left

his old home cold and brown. My cousin left

her small apartment, she took the kids

and so her mother my aunt

she followed her daughter and she left

the family home the one that her mother died in,

sold it with all the kid’s

names carved into the concrete out front.

And then my grandma she died

and I tried to keep the house but my son’s grandmother she said no. Next my uncle

he’s leaving and his kids

my cousins are going through all the printed photos they can find inside the cracks

and I think about

the house that my father’s father died in,

his face white and his mouth open,

the house my mother tore down and built upon

something bigger, the new entry of the house where my bedroom used to be.

Does it mean something or nothing at all. These people

do they leave their homes loosely

while the homes stick to my skin,

molasses.

I can spin around them in my mind so does it make them still real,

I can walk around them in my mind so does it mean something or nothing at all,

are the homes less than what we make them to be;

what does it mean that the only thing more important than these people,

are these things,

homes. We spend time. Breathe in cry in cradle in. Does it mean something wild that we can’t quite hold;

or is it just a big quiet nothing,

a big false focus we fall into

as we live our lives fear struck