Capturing Campus: The Archway

The Archway 

my great-grandmother had a house

she’s gone

but the house breathes

its strange breaths

strange faces

strange furniture

strange footsteps

imprinted by foreign feet

I remember the house

and it’s frightening to think that someday I won’t

that nobody will

that the memory will die with me

you’re getting so tall

she said before we left

beneath the archway in her living room

neither she nor I will ever stand beneath it

again, I am frightened that the memories

won’t be memories anymore

not that they will be conflagration-charred

cataclysmically-consumed

made holed and holy by a marksman’s arsenal 

but that they will dry up and fade

wet footprints on concrete

during the fourth of July 

when the weather was warm as the parade marched by 

I sat inside a home I might never see 

again, I am frightened

that anyone and everything is only mine

for a little while

that life is only for a little while