5 Wallpaper
I want to live in the wallpaper at the funeral home.
Can you see it? Few colors, white, grays, and greens.
showing distant hills. A simple artist’s rendering.
A red house sits behind a brief hill suggesting an old
school. The split rail fence, still true and unworn,
now settled near lanky birch swaying spring leaves.
In the beyond, white houses, perhaps a town. One needs
good vision to see who lives there and wonder why. It is
the red house where I live.
No longer a school holding decades of memories with the
rusted iron swing for children years grown and gone. I will swing
there soon and consider the gentle mountain far away.
Gentle images of a time long ago.
Thank you for taking the time to support this poem.
Grateful I took pictures of the wallpaper before it was removed years ago.
Beginning and end — succinct and “hooks” both.
“I want to live in the wallpaper at the funeral home.” Oh, how very many images came to my Mind’s Eye upon my first reading of this poem. In reality, my mind went to black, white, and sepia tones with a melancholy tone, so that introduction of greens grabbed my attention and made me back up — and this time (even before the rest of the poem), I thought about gentle stillness. The greens all made the funeral home a bit less somber for me.
Your closing line was blissful: “I will swing /
there soon and consider the gentle mountain far away..” I am not there right now, at least so my poems are revealing to me, but I would like to arrive at that place of tranquility which you capture so eloquently.
Thank you for your thoughtful comment. I truly appreciate taking the time and supporting this poem.
I love this … but cannot put my finger on why.
The more I read it, the more I think I understand only to read it again and see something new … that is very clever writing in my book.
Thank you for taking the time and for supporting this poem.