City IV

How many times have I done this before?

Taken these broken stones
to rebuild this broken house.

Was this stone ever fresh?
Once, when it was whole… maybe
That is but a distant memory.

Yet. I start fresh –
with broken things,
The debris of dust and air.
The remains of yesterday.

I always took a moment to look
at the calmness that lay afterwards.
At the poignant beauty of destruction
The charred remains of a life rewritten

Like a tree that grows from a raped stump
A few moments of naked brown flesh
Then the business of green growth
For what else is it but business?
This rebuilding of broken lives?

If emotions were involved
A poem would be uttered at the end
May be a few tears;
Then the chapter would be closed – it would be
The very last end!
The land would be left behind.
Not this rehashing and re-birthing of lives.

So, I rebuild these walls
Rebuild this door, this window.
I rebuild using these discarded yesterdays
Knowing that tomorrow or maybe the day after
All of this would be destroyed again.

I can already hear the grumbling winds.
It's far - maybe I'll get a few months, years?
I know it's expect of me to forget
But I can never seem to not remember.

That this home – this town – this city
That I am building was nothing
but ruins yesterday -
The broken stones in my hands - today

As I carry on the tradition –
This cycle of emotion-free chore
Of rebuilding from the ruins once again.

This business of Living
That started many yesterdays ago.

How many times have I done this before?

----------------------------------------------------------

first published in Cafe Dissensus Everyday.