The Old Houses Of Vigan Poem by RIC BASTASA

the old houses
claim their right
not not be changed

they shiver when
you touch
any of their
walls

they fear that you
may soon change
your mind
and proclaim
that beauty lives
in new
creations

you ask yourself
if truth is truer
when tested by the
fading of time

or its ultimate
disappearance upon
the cajolery of
recent promises

the truth frowns upon
you
you are late
and you walk upon the
shallowness of
those reddish bricks

the old houses are howling
with the winds of
change

they have outlived fire
and played on those
earthquakes and
floods

you walk away
and you simply let them be
beautiful in their own ways
magnificent
in those dresses of
cracking paints

they still look regal
on those faces
framed by stones

surely, they have the right
still to be here.