[Critique Group 2] Joan's offering

[Joan Myles]

Dear Colleagues,

This is probably going to end up as part of a bigger piece, but for now
will leave it without a title.

Blessings,
Joan

I can’t see over the wall that separates us

The wall between the home for the aged

and everyone else

But I hear things

And it sounds like things are happening

Like a kind of life goes on

The loudest voices are those of the attendants

Taking their breaks every few hours

Smoking their forbidden cigarettes and whooping it up

About their lives outside this place

The place behind the wall

The wall I can’t see past

Even after dark I hear them talking and laughing

Not quite whooping but still smoking

The attendants who keep time so  faithfully for themselves

the residents  have their schedules too

I hear the food trucks every Tuesday morning

Deliveries of fresh meats and vegetables and frozen goods

And occasionally

the aroma of beef stew with onions and mushrooms wafts my way

Intermingled with the cigarette smoke

Or I wake up wanting bacon for breakfast

Because I can smell what’s for breakfast behind the wall

Even if I can’t see past it

And I hear the bus on Sundays

Taking some lucky  residents shopping or to church perhaps

I can’t tell where they go

I can only imagine where they might go

Where they are permitted to go

Because I can’t get past the wall

Sometimes I hear things from the  upper rooms

Voices on the television turned up extremely loud

As if the resident can barely hear anything

Outside his own head

Beyond his own thoughts and longing

As if even inside the building there are walls

And sometimes the very loud television becomes oddly silent again

As if the walls were breached

And finally someone made it over the top and into the building

Up the stairs  and into the tiny curtained room

Someone with a basket of flowers and a crown of stars

With  his own  schedule to keep
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