Keepsakes
by R. J. Walker Miller
They keep the knife,
for they know they must not forget.
The years have warped its pinewood handle
and eternalized the stains upon its blade.
The walls and floor are gouged and gashed,
ancient wounds left to fester unstitched;
the rugs are torn and deeply stained,
the furniture shattered and bent.
They dare not treat the old home’s scars
lest deeper wounds scab over.
Sometimes
when their lonely candle sputters,
when its feeble light cannot quite warm the shadows,
they are tempted to release him.
They look at the heavy cellar door
with its rattling locks, bolts, and chains,
and they listen to his pleading.
But before guilt can move either of them
they cast tired eyes about their house.
Knife, walls, wounds. Knife.
And neither needs to peer out the cracked window
to see the child’s grave
cradled between the roots of two withered willows.