Another Age
It is a museum of a house.
Another age. An age of less.
A few chairs, spare and simple.
A desk. A table with a candle
and open journal.
Light through the window
fills the empty spaces.
There is a sense of quiet here.
No need for noise. Nothing superfluous.
Nothing unneeded. Nothing unused.
That, more than the painted Windsor chairs,
is what charms you. That space,
The lack of things unneeded.
It is as much a part of the museum
as the displays, part of history,
part of your own. That emptiness
that is not sparse and lacking,
but full of the most wonderous of things.
Possibility.
About this poem
You would not know it to visit my home, but I am a minimalist at heart. Happy to have fewer things. More space and light and time. For me, spaces like the one above (the picture is from the American Frontier Museum in Staunton, Va.) are incredibly soothing, peaceful, and wistful.
Tom
Quarry House 
Me too but my house is an eclectic muddle.
Love the photo and the poem, for I, too, am a minimalist at heart. My wife and I appreciate our simple Danish furniture and clutterless decor. Indeed, there is beauty in simple lines and simple things — and wishing life sometimes would more closely mimic that simplicity.
I have a true colonial aethetic – not “country colonial” but the true simplicity like in the Photograph. My life has been spent trying to hold the rest of life at bay.
This museum is such a great example of how to keep your home minimalistic. The lack of things is so refreshing and makes the space feel even more special.
So true. I think somehow, we have lost the art of space.