Sestina Of The House Poem by Sally Evans

I slid to a halt at the house,
turned the car in the driveway
on the platform above the river
where the trout stream runs down
while I stood breathing memories
and understanding change.

There weren't many changes.
The garden surrounding the house
was well-kept, but in memory
flowers crowded the driveway
and paths where I wandered down
to the cool grass. Time is a river

and this tributary of the river
had a pool. I threw in some change
and watched silver disks drift down
to wish good fortune on the house.
Not ready to drive away
from such rampant memories

or seeds lost in the stones of memory
and now sprouting in the river
of time, I glance down the driveway
wishing this moment never to change.
There is no one in the locked house
and I so early coming down.

I need to tell or write down
these new gifts of memory
sprung from the stone of the house
and joining the full river
of time, in which change
is inevitable. The driveway

is the way there and back, the driveway
links to the road going down
to the motorway interchange,
leaving stories of locked memories
which will leach away to the river
from the secluded house.

So I'll leave the house by the driveway,
let the river calm itself down
as my memories change.