The Moment Before

After a long winter, the new grass is jarring.
Color where there has been none,
where snow has lain for months,
white on white with the barn’s faded red paint
in the background.

You pass this barn every day.
And every day you remind yourself to stop,
to take a photograph of the rickety doorway.
You know it will not last much longer.

In all the years of driving past,
you have never seen anyone walking through,
in or out of the barn. No one has worked there.
From time to time there are changes.
WIndows broken. A sag in the roofline.

A lifetime of watching buildings of a certain age
has taught you the timelines. This one has little left.
The barn is well used. The doorway, not so much,
evidently unimportant. Benign neglect.

This one has little left.
On a windy day, the walls sway.
In spring, vines have begun to grow
through the glassless windows.
It has become a withered appendage.

Finally, here on the cusp of spring,
you do what you have been telling yourself to do
for years. You stop. You grab your camera
and take the picture you have meant to take all this time.
You walk up close, let your hand feel
the weathered wood. It feels like a last visit
to a dying friend.

There is love there. But a love that will soon begin
to fade as presence fades.
Or maybe a different kind of love.
Something bittersweet.

Taking a photograph only takes a moment.
You are not one to spend time composing
and overthinking the shot. You have a good eye
and you trust it. You know what is good.
You see it before you raise the camera to your eye
and in moments, you have your shot.

But then, you linger. Allowing the time
for the space to soak into your soul
in a way that passing it on the road
at sixty miles an hour never allows.

About this poem.

The barn is in the next town over, and two days after I took the picture, the whole entryway collapsed. The poem has been rattling around for a long time. I am finally in a place where it came together.

A poem about old buildings. About neglect in relationships and caring for people. A poem about not waiting to do the things that are important. A poem about slowing down. Poetry is never about one thing.

Be well. Travel wisely,

Tom