She lived next door in an old
clapboard house.
Gosh I must have been eight
to her eighty.
Mostly she just sat in her chair by
the north bay window.
She would stare outside obvious
of some memory.
I would stop by the old place nearly
every day or so.
You know these old houses
mostly the smells.
She had a new story to tell each
time I came in.
About a one room school or when
the James Boys dropped by.
She would talk about growing up poor
and meeting her love.
Of raising her children, who both were
fine men.
I don’t know why I just thought about
this dear lady. And
I wish I had kept a journal for her wise
sayings and such.
But a young boy doesn’t think of
those things very often.
He only worries about the moment,
puppies and stuff.