#i have Thoughts every time i read someone else's usu very angsty post about it

[rainintheevening]

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Hard floor under knees

Shock in wood meeting skin and bone

And a warm rush like water

Smell of mothballs and old wood and the beef broth from dinner

Squinting in a different light

Mother is a quick thought, echoing of old forgotten joy

Mum

Dad

How could they have forgotten?

England, war and all, like a long lost nurse embracing them

Welcomes them back in the flush of youth and

White-haired, bright-eyed curiosity

A guiding hand to steady where the swords hang no longer

Tracing lines between the older stars of this old home

And questions

Belief behind the spectacles that draws out trust, laughter

Letters race away toward the battered house in Finchley

So much not said, but enough to say what matters

Love, love, miss you, the Professor is a brick, miss you, love

The shirts and skirts and shoes fit well enough

Even wistful memory cannot keep plain food from filling bellies

But minds and hearts are stretched too far to fall back into the same places

Imagination on a holy scale

Some wriggling is required to make it settle in

Knuckles press to wood, questioning, hopeful

But where there was a door there is only a wall

Aches of doubt soothed by voices

Telling what the other eyes have seen

And in that big old house and in those lawns and woods

Some magic lingers

Wood is warmer than stone they remember