The three "Rs"

still the knocking
remains
the slight thud
on a wooden door
in inexhaustible
persistence
faint, the taps
at first
mere figments
dancing in the ears
easily tossed into
a box of explanations
yet it was the repetition
which served as the key
to a gate leading
to its own hell
and how it cast
its devious spell
a light, almost gentle
but most haunting
resounding tap
echoing in the
mental corridors
the way children's
laughter carried
through the halls
of the ancient family estate
a once lively sight
reduced to the foreboding
facade that now remains
drained of both children
and laughter and light
and life
the wet gray stones
don't even hold moss
or lichens, just bareness
as a woman would weep
at the news
so the tapping pours
like tears from that devastation
a constant reminder
that what was locked away
in one of the many attic chambers
remains and remembers
and is relentless

Weather women

the four weather women
always fight over
whose time it is
the hems of their dresses
impede on each other
as they gather
in an endless circle
they chatter and bicker
to coerce the sun dial
to shine on them
they shove each other
in their disheveled silks and threads
as their hair flows like the tides
tangles, knots and releases
one cries... one burns...
one leaves... one is still
all take and all give
yet in their own times
they all shine
as the stars that
hold their fate

Gray day

the gray is a spell
summoned by
winter herself
it is the blanket
being spread out
for the time of rest
and as children fight
their parents when
they're told it's bedtime
the trees rebel
with defiant colors
but they too will soon
spread their own blanket
upon nodding rose and fern
succumbing to
the frozen wonder
of frost's first kiss