Bring Him Home

I still miss him every day.
The studio has a few precious touchstones
that trigger the corners and pockets of my memory
and light up an arc
between this world and the next.

An impossibly thin teaspoon
made of coin silver
a crackled golden holiday ornament
dangling from an old fishing rod
a shiny little porcelain figurine
from the Red Rose Teabag collection…

and this card
the last we got from Polly
to thank us for a dinner we hosted
which features a print of a painting Ted did of their house in Chilmark.

Their spirits are free to roam now
and while Polly visits her wind chime to keep me company in the garden
Ted is right there on my shoulder… always
tweaking the muses and directing the brushes.

On the island it is different.
I think it must be harder for their myriad island friends.
It’s a small place, and hard not to drive by their house
to get almost anywhere.

Last year we all but drove off the road
when we came around the bend and saw the old structure
risen like Lazarus from it’s resting place
and jacked up 10 feet off of the ground.

Renovations had begun
and a skeleton remained
Peat black wooden ribs laid bare of their clapboard
and scaffolded light pouring into the dark maw of a foundation…
the absolute void of the centuries of human life lived within.

Even my deep love of archeology and history
and origin-of-the-species exploration
that so enjoys a good treasure hunt
was numbed by the wave of grief
and the smacked into realization
that they were not
as I had comfortably come to fool myself
still sitting
just there in the front room
nodding in the wing chair
beside the window,
with the light on

That warm soft light
was a beacon for many a traveler.
I for one couldn’t bear that corner to be dark…
So, I painted it back on.