A Century of Seasons: Beneath the Gable

Lyrics

The sun warms my western face. Another Tuesday.
I have known ten thousand Tuesdays.
The rain tastes the same as it did then.
Only the trees have changed their height.

Nineteen twenty-three. I remember the smell.
Fresh-cut pine and the sharp scent of wet red clay.
My bones were set one by one, a spine against the sky.
The hand that drew the line, he knew how a house should breathe.
Then the first key turning the lock.
The first winter light slanting through empty rooms.
Waiting.

And the May pollen comes, a yellow-green dust on every sill.
And the August humidity hangs, heavy in my eaves.
The oaks let go in October, a rustling blanket on my lawn.
The low winter sun traces the lines of my gable.
I watch. I hold. I remain.

The children who ran on my floors have children of their own, somewhere else.
The great oaks, once saplings, now cast long, shifting shadows.
They drink from the same deep earth I rest on.
That slow, constant breath of the Georgia clay, expanding, contracting.
A secret pressure my foundation has known for a hundred years.
It holds me. We are in agreement.

And the May pollen comes, a fine, gritty powder on the glass.
And the August humidity hangs, a visible weight in the air.
The oaks let go in October, a crisp surrender to the wind.
The low winter sun traces the sharp angle of my gable.
I watch. I hold. I remain.

Sometimes I feel the cold find the old cracks in the window frames.
A whisper of woodsmoke from a neighbor's fire.
I remember the weight of the one big snow.
A silent, heavy peace.
My roof tiles bake in the summer, each one a small, held breath against the heat.

The light is leaving now.
The shadows stretch and disappear.
The moon will find my eastern face soon.
Another season is turning in its sleep.
And I am here. Still.