2013/silence

“Wow,” I say outloud,
pushing the bedroom
door open all the way,
“the silence of this house.”

The bed silent,
the wrinkles at the bottom
of the velvet pillow
at the back of the chair.
The new white socks
I meant to drop in the
hamper.
Late in the day – early evening
really, toward the end
of October.
Nothing in my life seems to speak
to me, or to answer
when I call out.
A kind of contentment in
the olive shirt and jacket
I wear, left over from
several seasons past.
Appreciation – or comfort
that anything endures,
that anything is there already
which didn’t have to be struggled
toward today.
Something just is,
which matters more than
what isn’t.
I sit on the sofa watching
cars hurry home in the last
light of day, grateful for my
plain clothes,
for what of my life there is.

10/25/13