Relics

The highway sign flashes

caution caution caution

and pavement is ripped,

coming up in chunks,

vehicles funneled tightly,

as I return to my childhood

home, and signs in my mind

flash as well. I reminisce in

the fading daylight on the

porch where Dad sat in

his last days, as summer

now wanes slightly. Next

day, Mom and I cart off

a truckload to auction, high chairs

and other relics of someone

I was and somehow still am,

an emptying house, another type of

season ending, the parting out

of things, outward effects of

life lived well, but not always

easily. We leave our lot behind,

knowing we carry other things

burnished with the wind and

water of age, carry them in us,

shining more brightly than

any polished antique.