My mother’s home sits halfway up the hill, exhausted,
like it abandoned the idea of ever reaching the top.
The red brick, covered in vine, is heavy with responsibility.
A series of children. One on top of the other.
Above it, the town’s old folks’ home. Wheelchairs propped
against the railing, residents settled on the porch.
It wants to crawl uphill, to the cemetery at the crown.
But our ancestors’ bones stake it in place like a tent.
This staging area for the unstated. Don’t make me say it.
The ground is hard. Nothing gives. At night, my mother
dresses in a fresh nightgown and walks a wire to visit them.
Unsteady herself, I fear she won’t remember how her window
opens to get back inside. Children still ride bikes here.
The bleak swaddled in blankets stare. They’ve abandoned
the notion of returning home. Only the caretaker’s bungalow
made it to the top. Secured and fixed. A tiny house with a shed
for his Bobcat and mower. A young couple dances
beneath the stoop light. A radio’s bright music. All funeral
processions pass this way. Each shiny hearse, a racehorse. Startled
at the smell of open earth. Held back from sprinting to the top.
This is what a house wants: a bond with the sky, peace
with the ground, an occasional flirtation with lightning.
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 25, Issue 6.
Dawn Dupler’s poetry has been featured on the buses and trains of St. Louis’s MetroLink and in journals such as Natural Bridge, Whiskey Island, Moon City Review, and others. She is co-author of the book St. Louis in the Civil War and a James H. Nash poetry contest finalist. Dawn has an MFA in Writing and a BS in Chemical Engineering. Retiring early from corporate life, Dawn now teaches Composition and Creative Writing at the St Louis Community College and works as an Associate Editor of december literary journal. Find her at dawndupler.com.
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