Gritty City End

Finally doors clank-clank open
another cloned hallway, Spartan spare
doors have no identities than tags;
and wear from use there is oh so much more
well used or poor, so much the story
left untold, were there smiles arms to enfold;
or blusters and cold more biting
than winter or high rise winds.

Inside, the old maple table had traveled so far
once cradled a high back sofa to a window
overlooking high cliffs and the shore;
once,  red maple stock hefty beyond expectation
hard wood from half century ago
when near space was still far and new, and dreams were
delights still and family was a verb in present tense,
etched into hard wood underneath, somewhere initials
next to another’s.

Letting go, now
the view downtown has not changed
revived to lost and revived again
new blood and faster beats,
factories became living rooms
distant views of mountain faces
City skyline glimpses for sale;
and leaving it all, closing the book

for having read it and breathed it in,
it is now inside of me or it never will be 
and waiting, waiting, waiting for the lights
and the doors to open, to lift me out.