a diary of words, paper and other ephemeral things

loving gaze

Where it began: stilt houses

Skeletal remains emerging

from algae-green pools

Awe blooming at heart level

for faded places, forgotten

I whisper “thank you for open eyes”

now I lovingly see

crooked barns

crumbling factories

boarded-up businesses

debris piles left behind

wild-torn houses

places hold people, hold stories…

and now no one is left

to tend to these places,

they were once a flurry of

motion, aliveness, everyday mundanity

now no one bothered

to even tear them down

burn remains

memorialize their time here

honor what was