when I visit
the house I grew up in
I am a child again
the front porch swing
I built in my teens still hangs
four decades hence
the trees we planted
from helicopter seeds
tower over the house now
the bay window is gone
there’s a pool out back
but it’s still the house that I know
I wonder if
the walls could talk
if they remember me
do they tell stories
to those who live there
about when I was a child
do the children there now
still slide in their socks down the
long hardwood-floor hall
do they hop over the fence
to play tennis each day
then drink iced tea to cool down
does the family play games
in the backyard in summer
with neighbors who just drop by
who sleeps in my room now
and do they hear echos of
my old 45s
do they swing in the swing
that I built in college that still
lives in the house where I lived
when I visit the house
that I grew up in
the stories from my youth return to me
and the child who lived there
who lives on in me still
is home again
