What Remains

Is this all that's left?
asks my son, just dropping in.

The inlaid wooden chest 
my father made with love 
when they were first married
served in four houses 
before I brought it down South
like a coffin to rest here.

For years his tools stalled
like new in their boxes, 
until one day I found him
planing a piece of wood,
and I gathered up the curly shavings 
and held them to my nose
in the shed the new people have taken away,
but not the smell he said was cherry
or the scar on my palm,
when he let me use the chisel.

I open the chest,
in which she stored the linen and towels
she ironed with love,
and I catch a faint trace of naphthalene,
enough for a flickering memory rush.

Is this all that's left?

Yes, everything else went into care,
except for her two girls on a beach
from their last front room,
gathering dust in the garage,
and his watch, which is broken.
Oh, and there's their carriage clock
he fiddled with,
and got on her nerves,
also beyond repair.

.

Reviews

[Gee]

Funny how memories are jogged by smells, tastes, sounds. Loved this, would love to be able to capture moments as you have done here

[Gerald Parker]

Thanks, Gee. Are you going to post your work on Write and be Damned? It needs more people.

[Gee]

Never heard of it and to be fair my " work" is rather simple rhyming verse. Not that we'll received by many, unless you happen to be still using crayons and having aspirations to either be a milk monitor or prefect....

[Gee]

'Kin hell....well

[Gerald Parker]

Perhaps you're not the Gee from UKAuthors?

[Gee]

More like the Gee from "God he's posted another"

[Gerald Parker]

Gee whizz.

[Gee]

Exactly......