Don'T Cry Old Room Don'T Cry! Poem by Dónall Dempsey

The room is ashamed
of its nakedness

stripped down
to nothing

but these four walls.

It tries to cover
its emptiness

with a few scattered
memories.

Its emptiness
(disturbed by our looking)
almost cries.

It is a room no longer
(merely a container)

that struggles
to remember

a time told
in humans.

It listens
to our footsteps

leaving footprints

in the time
turned to dust

blowing bubbles
as we walk from
room to room


bubbles blossoming
through the tiny hoop

& where they alight
Time flowers again

& it is possible
To hear the distant

laughter of
those distant years.

The rooms
dressed again

in voices
& humans

that make it
come alive.

Outside
Time waits

like an immense
wrecker’s ball

(prepared for now
to turn a blind eye)

for the humans
to complete

their sentimental
journey

knowing that
in the next

half-
-hour:

It will be
as if

none of this

... exists.

The humans
lulled by the train asleep

as it speeds
through Time & Distance

waking through
it

in dreams

...dreams.