Saying Goodbye

There was a place when I was small

Built strong and firm, no nail at all

Four rooms were there, two beds in one

Where children grew up and left...

His grandchild lay her head

on a carefully made feather bed

One room, the kitchen, furnished with skilled hands

By a man who worked and lived off the land

A wood burning stove, a table, three chairs

One for him, one for me, one for her

She left to sing

I watched her leave us sitting on my swing

There was a room for sitting

on a cold winters day

Around the wooden stoked heater we would cling

for all the warmth it would bring to our hands

Another room remained silent and locked

I was told a long time ago

a son was lost inside of it

the memory pained him so

One day... he left me as well

Never to return

I sat in my swing and listened as she said her goodbye

to the man who raised us both

without a tear in her eye

I watched as he was placed in the ground

A life lesson hard to understand at such a young age

Yet, he had taught me how to handle heartbreak

and rage...

The home and furniture built with care

was bulldozed down

Not a month had passed since he lay down

The only item left there

is my swing

Where I learned that

love means everything...