The House No More Poem by Alizon Kiel

I was inside the house where I felt the warmth, the warmth that I remembered
I reached to touch the lightly painted flower sketches hanging across from the mirror in the entryway
I turned but did not see my own reflection just those pictures hanging on little nails on the wall behind
A soft glow came from the kitchen where I glimpsed bowls and plates rinsed but still in the sink
He always cleaned them before he loaded them into the dishwasher
Their bowls and plates were thin and microwavable with little flowers scraping away from a center
I saw the sagging Brillo pad nestled in the gaping mouth of the green ceramic frog with darker green warts and a funny pink tongue
I touched the edge of the sink still sprinkled in warm water and tiny bubbles and I couldn’t escape the feeling that my grandfather had gone to mow the lawn or was out in the garage tinkering, yet I did not hear the familiar noises either would have made

In the living room I ran my hands over the handle of the cabinet that folded out like a desk and thought how sometime soon my grandfather’s ashes would be there wrapped up in white paper like a present
I found the turntable was still hidden behind soft mesh and gold thread and brown wooden cut-outs looking like a speaker and it might have been, but you could open it like a cabinet
Underneath on the shelf there was a carousel that held the 8-track tapes the ones I played with, spinning the carousel and wondering what they were, for a very long time
I liked the smooth feel of their plastic, the brightness of their color, their pictures the same as record jackets, how hard you had to push to get them into their player when I figured out what that was and where to find it
In the corner I could see the back patio covered in green and flowers peeking through the vertical blinds with the tangled chain and one blind askew
My grandmother potted and repotted her plants out there even when she could not walk
She put clippings in her pockets to bring home from almost every place we’d been
I passed the couch running my hand lightly on an arm, it was the couch they had kept when I was the smallest
I remembered its orange and brown and dark wood trim and the pillow they had given me with cowboys running along the fabric that I had stapled when it tore and held in my arms during a storm
My grandmother’s chair still stood there sort of itchy with her cane beside it
She had gone and left her cane yet I could not escape the feeling that I had seen her in the corner of my eye

So glad for the warmth I remembered
For the detail so perfectly preserved
And yet I had the sinking under warm water and tiny bubbles feeling that the whole world had stepped out
Simply stepped out in the middle of everything...