Free of gravity, the halls
Aren’t so bad to wander.
Unchained, forced to remain
a ghost among grey faces,
my expiration date set.
Zombie, leper. Co-worker’s
Afraid to catch the ailment
this sudden urge for desertion
To upend the world and step
Into the unknown, or worse,
step into nothing at all.
and packed away, in boxes, dresses and shoes,
the silk underthings still wrapped in tissue.
We sorted through cedar chests. We gathered
and set aside the keepsakes and the good silver
and brought up from the coal cellar
jars of tomato sauce, peppers, jellied fruit.
We dismantled, we took down from the walls,
we bundled and carted off and swept clean.
Goodbye, goodbye, we said, closing
the door behind us, going our separate ways
from the house we had emptied,
and which, in the coming days, we would fill
again and empty and try to fill again.
–Peter Everwine
