To the House on 134th, a Ghazal

To the House on 134th, a Ghazal

Amanda Ryan

When we first moved in we discovered rats living inside the house.
Beneath the slanting battleship kitchen floor, a can of whoop was raised.

We’ve found other things since then, a purse, earrings, and misplaced stickers.
When the kids found the fairy house in the bushes, a hallelujah do wop was raised

Light streams through white nine-pane window frames and onto mint green walls.
When a breeze blew, the rusting rooster’s wind chime’s coop was raised.

Sometimes the old owner stops by to see what’s been done to the place.
His eyes glaze over as though his dead mother, frail and stooped, was raised

For now, my children bear their ages, their bright busyness, on this place.
Here is where their earliest memories’ still-framed loop was raised.

I hear the owner plans on demolishing the house when we leave.
And who will mind it all if what was lost and drooped was raised?

For now I sign my name on the lease, and lend this place that ought to be
loved, more lost items, more moments where holy alley-oop was raised.

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Amanda Ryan
Homemaker

Amanda’s poetry has appeared in Curator Magazine, The Christian Century, Mezzo Cammin, and Grand Little Things.

Photography by Volkan Vardar