Cleaning the Living Room*

The dust hovers
unsettled in the sunlight
threatening to land
on the patterned grains
of tables at rest.

I observe the suspension
of noise, remembering the
activity:
buzzing, rising, howling,
softening.

The children are gone.

It is time
to put things in order.
Restack the books,
ensconce the trinkets to
their pride of place,
lay out the careful pages
of precious books
too fragile for the 3 year old.

I ponder - is it time?
Time to clear the shelves,
store the volumes,
the puzzles, the blocks,
the at-hand playthings
that entertain?
Their visits are so seldom now--
we might not need these
simple supplies of childhood.

I notice I'm moving materials,
organizing, streamlining, rearranging,
but there is more being handled
than just the objects of my
affection.

Something is being made anew in me,
a chapter of change
on the inside
where 'within' will
be the work at hand,
moving the 'furniture',
changing the view
from the inside out.

Maybe it's time to take back this space
and return it to its rightful owners,
make room for the youthful visitors
as guests (not takeover artists :-).

Yes, I think I'll clean my living room.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
'clean'--there's that word again. (see my previous post for the New Year.)
Linking with dVerse Poets for Open Link night.

(p.s. I love my children and their children. Really I do.)

A very clean 2013


Well, it seems that way
anyway.
Clean and all.
Open, blank, unwritten on.

And the smashing white/blue
sky is limitless today.
How unlike
our skies to be that
way
this day.

But it is (a gift!
Thank you, God.)

SO, making the most
of a Beautiful Good Thing
I will do what any
ordinary human ought to do.

Start well
by cleaning the bathrooms (check)
balancing two months' of the checkbook
(almost check)
and pruning the overgrown
out of shape
too tall branches on the
pink blooming viburnum
which,
sure as it's January,
always blooms pink for me
just when I need it.
~~~~~~~~~~~

Linking with dVerse Poets Open Link Night--
first of the New Year.
More inspiring words over there....