thinking

the neighborhood sits still and quiet
and the children are gone.
those who have moved away or died,
their cars rest in the driveways.
no one leaves in early mornings
or returns at dusk, just trees
and the branches that hang like ghosts
of people we've been before.

ice hardens like sharp glass
along the gutterways, a stark
and harsh light lining my way
back to this place that slips down
in silence at the end of each day
and the faint voices of childsplay
echo like a distant symphony
somewhere in the back roads.

no more stories of the old country
or dinners around the table where
so many dinners used to be,

no more old and and empty souls
retiring to recliners, sinking
into television sets that snow
when the station is off the air

no more mothers, fathers
yet i dream of where they've gone.
i shake and miss the morning break,
and fade into the dawn.