Random Acts of Poetry

Moving Day

With the rooms empty
and every door ajar
and the boxes down the stairs,
a potent stillness,
the outrider of change,
drifts in,

brushes the baseboards,
maunders and swirls,
finding no one in the livingroom
nothing in the kitchen
to stop or delay it,
only faded shades,

floors that creak,
dustballs in corners,
blank spaces on walls.
Forgotten objects--
a missing shoe, a broken toy,
magazines and coat hangers,

a glass by the sink,
old newspapers,
last year's calendar--
alone testify
to someone's life,
this interrupted story.

Once, fingers wandered
over guitar strings;
the bathroom mirror
held tired faces,
a day began and ended
that mattered somehow,

footsteps were heard,
a door opened,
babies screamed, children left.
Now, only the light changes,
like the sky relected in water,
a vague and broken image.

At night, the lights of cars
rushing up the street
animate the walls
and make shadows dance
like dogged memories
across the bedroom floor.