The Price of it All

The storefronts are empty. The windows, dark
and you are left wondering what might have been,
what was, and worst of all why so many
lie empty and abandoned,

why they are still owned and why
those owners insist each one has such a high value
after years and years of neglect, why
they price them so exorbitantly, no one can possibly reach out

and save them.

About this poem

The picture was taken in downtown Troy. In what was once called the antique district, but now has almost no stores of any type open. To me, it’s a picture of possibility, untill you check and price what people want for some of those buildings. It would be hard to buy them and fix them up without losing your financial shirt.

I see the same thing in relationships. People battered and abandoned emotionally years, decades ago, but never actually released so that restoration was possible.

It breaks my heart sometimes, both for the buildings, and the people.

Tom