her quavering fingers rubbing against the disintegrating surface,
nostalgically, painfully, very Aware.
The home she once lived in
raised beautiful children in
that belongs to someone else now, that is visibly changed now,
lives in the past, on a crinkled photograph, and
in the crinkled lines around her eyes and mouth, perhaps
in the gray hairs framing her face.
Closing her weary eyes, she imagines
a walk through that old hallway, into a small chalky white room
with the lines marking height on the door's frame
and the scuff marks in the floor from children's play.
She can almost see it in front of her. It is torture, this ghostly vision of a golden age
but the vision is tainted with What's Real. The walls
echo with silence, the paint smacks of newness.
There are no toys to be played with, no hair
to be tousled.
The children are grown and they've left now. There is a bitter taste
in her mouth.
