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