The strands of us all

lived in a tassled green pouch,

bound by thread and bloodline.

 

The house that held it

still holds my softest days

in dream sequence;

 

of them all, slow Sunday afternoons

out back, in the care of hands

that performed miracles -

 

a table for my dolls to dine,

a wardrobe for their clothes,

a seesaw solid enough

 

for every one of us, and we’d convene

on the oak and take turns

soaring skyward.

 

Under the corrugated roof, we

shared a feathered semi-silence;

it nestled there, contented

 

and I'd follow the dust motes

as they floated down on a sunbeam

to meet the sawdust

 

that carpeted the shed floor;

fresh tendrils from the steady hand’s

tempo, his maker’s rhythm.