Voices in the Rain: A Poem

Voices in the Rain

I can hear them talking about me

The sound of heavy rain outside

The incessant flowing of water

From birth to death

Creating the whisper of voices in the room next door

An old musting overcoat in the closet

Now unworn – two sizes too big

I have no need for it

I’m inside, listening to the whispers

And the rain outside

Boxes of old newspapers piled up in the hallway

Old news on faded paper, cross words done

Black and white boxes penned in

Walls of photographs framed by dust

Gathering like the water outside

An old bicycle, tyres flat, wheels never to turn again

But my head spins with the voices in the rain

A wheelchair in the kitchen

The medication boxes stacked upon its seat

Like the last Sunday mass – unattended

Curtains frayed and moth-eaten

Half-drawn just to let a little light in I don’t need

Cracked window glass and walls of stone and brick

The spiders make their homes

Huge intricate webs of community

A vacant fireplace starving in the corner

Coals ready in a scuttle waiting to become diamonds

The last of the smoke and heat

It escaped a long time ago from this place

When old friends stopped rapping upon the door

I have a photograph – polished

I am that photograph

I have a house

I was that home

I have a family

I was a part of that family

I have a new pair of boots - never worn

They still sit by the backdoor

I hear their voices in the rain

Look at the pair of them

One to the other – are you there?

I’m still here with you my brother