I have a dear friend who I met in my Creative Writing class my freshman year in college. I sent the poem to her for her comments and edits because I knew she would make it better, and she did! Most of her adult life after college, she was an editor. Not that it matters, but she knows this cottage that I write about, and the man who lived with me in it.
The Yellow Cottage
Nestled between two imposing stories,
Squat, hunkered down,
Protected by a white picket fence,
Two blocks from the deep blue bay,
Where sea lions bark and gulls squawk,
And the foghorn sounds.
I stood outside the fence,
Camera raised and clicking,
Trying to capture a time
When I entered, with groceries and textbooks,
To find comfort on the couch.
My love and I lived within these cottage walls --
one bedroom,
a serviceable kitchen,
no laundry.
The years to come, just a dream --
Two hapless youths on our way.
Hope lived within us.
I stand before the cottage, decades on,
And he is gone, far too young.
I wonder at the life within those walls,
And yearn, once more, to enter that space
and absorb whatever energy and insight
The yellow cottage has to give.
Țară Crowley, 2024
