The Journal | A Poem

The Journal

By Ella Fischer

One hundred Septembers ago,

He gave a book to his dear.

“As you grow, it will too,

But only if you write every year.”

Ninety Septembers ago,

She found it under the bed--

But the bus was almost there:

She’d write tomorrow instead.

Eighty Septembers ago,

It was left to lie about,

Empty, drab, waiting for her,

Forgotten when she moved out.

Seventy Septembers ago,

Cardboard boxes crowded the floor;

Rough hands held it, threw it inside:

Found by a moving man, not her.

Sixty Septembers ago,

All it knew was dark and cold,

Decay and dust motes and dirt,

Blank pages crumbling with mold.

Fifty Septembers ago,

When a ray of light seeped in,

It felt a glimmer of hope,

A defiant glow in prison.

Forty Septembers ago,

The book’s hope had flown:

Still it longed for stains of ink,

For her to call it her own.

Thirty Septembers ago,

Someone creaked up the stairs.

There they were--then gone again,

Leaving the book unawares.

Twenty Septembers ago,

A blinding light shone inside,

Lighting up her wrinkled face--

Now in it she would confide.

Ten Septembers ago,

It was filled with her heart,

Of her joy and inkstains,

Of her life it takes part.

Now it watches the Septembers fly by,

From its place on the Mantle of Memories.

It watches her children and their children,

Forever flying in it’s reveries.