Five 17-SYLLABLE BARE ROOM POEMS

Five 17-SYLLABLE

BARE ROOM POEMS

1

You assured me

I was safe in the dark.

The room was bare.

Now, you’re gone.

2

Why the four walls?

Without them, sorrow

and pain would abscond

with the wind.

3

The photos down

from the wall, a patina

of memories linger.

4

If tears fall in a bare room

and no one sees them,

do they still fall?

5

Life is an exercise in clutter.

We cram bare rooms

we leave behind.                          

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PEACEFUL REFLECTIONS

PEACEFUL REFLECTIONS

Months after your passing, I hid

clandestine notes under a brick

behind a statue of Jesus.

I imagined the words skipping

free, delving beneath the gravesite,

and you, dousing the crimson pyre

Of past pain with my smudging tears.

All quiet here. Peaceful reflections

flutter skyward like summer doves.

In sadder graves imps gnash their teeth

in other-worldly cacophony.

I watch the children kicking

a soccer ball across the green.

I shudder at sneakered feet

walking across my someday grave.

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