Antique Store Mysteries
A poem
A poem
Aisles scented with pipe smoke and dust,
wooden floors burnished by a century’s footsteps.
Each warped cabinet, tarnished mirror, tells a story.
A chipped vase from 1920s Paris,
did a newlywed’s hands first wrap around its curves?
An oaken roll-top desk, its cubbies stuffed with faded files,
an accountant’s calloused fingertips
leaving an ink-blotted trail.
Rocking the pram’s plush veneer, I’m transported
to a gaslit nursery two world wars past.
Every tarnished teaspoon’s bowlful of tales untasted.
Objects abandoned to ironies of time,
yet encircled by deeper wisdoms.
The way a meadow’s grasses
harbour hints of clovers’ songs,
the way auras linger
after struck chords fall silent.
Here is the world’s jumbled memoir,
and we wander its chapters,
dreamers wading in the mysteries
of what endures.
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