Claire Fullerton - Writer

Home for Christmas

 

I used to come home

To the house we grew up in

And you used to be there

Eventually anyway

Every Christmas

You'd come swaggering in,

All beaming six foot-two of you,

All blue eyed and gray, three-quarter coat swaying,

In from Virginia,

The educated man,

Having culled a life of your own

That was so foreign to me,

A seeming theatrical revelry

That you existed in the middle of

Being as you were

A ring leader by nature

 

And the laughter you'd create

Still how it resonates

Within the walls of that house,

Within my ears ringing still

Laughter I've never heard the likes of

Rich as it was with such reverberation

Just like the music that you'd play

It all came specifically from you

As if music were something only you could play

And laughter a skill only you had

 

I used to watch you,

Study you,

The way that you walked,

The way that you talked,

The way that the air would change around you

 

You were something,

I knew it then and I know it now

But it is reflection I live with

When nobody ever told me how to live

Only with reflection

 

So now you have become a contemplation

And oh, how the mind vacillates without command

Saying if I had you once

Shouldn't it have gone on forever?

Saying decide right here and now

If it is better to have loved and lost

 

So now you are something to ponder

But then I think you always were;

The way you'd come swaggering in at Christmas,

Still,

I think you always were.