Not all who wait at the threshold mean to enter. Some wait for you to step out.
Fog thickens -
congeals.
Dread does the same
when it finds a place to stay.
Only then do I notice the lake
its exhale brushing my skin
like something returned
with unfinished business.
The pumpkins grin,
two wounds carved into smiles
by a child
who didn’t know
how long darkness can wait.
Their light isn’t fire.
It remembers.
The dock extends
into the water.
Each step answers
a weight it has held before.
And the boat,
the boat answers
without moving.
Its lanterns burn too bright,
framing two figures
thin as regret
against the dark.
One wears my mother’s shawl.
The other holds my father’s quiet.
They look at me -
not with longing.
With recognition.
Something settles in me then -
not fear.
Something clearer.
They are not waiting for me.
They are waiting with me.
I have been crossing
for years.
Seneca Lake once held me
as a boy,
fear small enough
to name.
The water turned cold
without warning.
I thought it changed.
I did.
Something followed ...
patient, certain
I would look back eventually.
Lincoln Street,
the house with its damp walls -
I thought the creaking
was age.
Now I know
it was keeping track.
Even here,
under a sun that hums
like it knows my hours,
shadows bend
as if remembering
other shapes.
Sometimes footsteps pause
at my window,
not entering,
just learning
where to stand.
I no longer use the word
death.
It answers too easily -
from the drain,
the stairs,
the space between seconds.
It understands waiting
better than I do.
At the end of the dock,
the ferryman stands.
He does not call.
He does not need to.
His toll is already taken,
my parents’ touch,
my childhood voice,
the names I no longer say
because they might return.
When I step forward,
it will not be from fear.
Only recognition -
that I have been leaving
longer
than I have stayed.
So if you pass here,
where the streetlight flickers -
leave nothing behind.
No coin.
No flower.
No name.
Light moves strangely
in this place.
And what you give
may not return
as yours.
GBS jr
1999
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