2022 Issue > Poetry > Ode to Indiana

Photo by Mikayla Faivre
Ode to Indiana
Hannah Duffield
Tired like a guard dog waiting through the night
I return to the family home which survives
Standing sturdy as a mighty oak
Overflowing with echoes of the past
Drifting across the mind’s eye
Just like falling leaves
Nestled behind the garage
Once sat the old woodshop
Back when Grandpap had stronger hands
And a sharper mind, and a lively body
The smell of sawdust lingers
Old stains sunken into tired concrete
Only a memory of a memory
Slipping away and gone in a breath
Blanketing the kitchen
Once was a forest of green
Which I eagerly explored
Just learning to crawl
While Grandma baked cookies
And family drank wassail
And snow fell gently outside
And a distant voice sang about Emmanuel
Now there is no singing, no snowfall, no forest
No cookie recipe to be found or remembered
Only artificial hardwood
Stealing away the green kitchen carpet
Taking bygone Christmases with it too
I cross the threshold one last time
Not greeted by the well worn rocking chair
Or the coffee table littered with decades of scrapbooks
Or the tube TV playing Saturday morning cartoons
Or the lively kitchen filled with daughters making dinner
Or the green kitchen carpet that only we could love
Or the relic rotary phone ringing on the wall
My coat hangs lonely in the closet
Knowing I will be ushered out before the weekend comes
One final stay, one last goodbye
Searching for comfort in a cold, empty house
Watching reflections of the good old days
Wondering:
What will they change,
The new family who bought our memories?
And will they feel our echoes
Whispering faintly through the leaves?
Will they feel me linger
The dog who guards these things?
I just came to say I miss you
And I love you
And hello.
Hannah Duffield is a sophomore at UW Platteville majoring in Forensic Investigation. She has been passionate about writing for as long as she can remember and dreams of publishing a novel one day. When she isn't writing, she is found baking or dancing. She can type 85 words per minute.
Mikayla Faivre is from North Freedom, Wisconsin, and is majoring in Animal Science. She has always been enamored by storytelling and spends her spare time reading or writing. Mikayla is a recipient of the David Cole Award in Creative Writing. This is her second year as an editor for the Spirit Lake Review. Find her on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mikfaivre/