Yesterday's Door Poem by Michael Nabert

The door is closed
yet somehow
the faintest whiff
of familiar scents
waft beneath,
hooking talons into my nose
and clawing deep
into memory,
uncorking
a silent gush
of ancient feelings
somehow still fresh.
It tethers me there,
sitting awkwardly on the floor
leaning my head against
the cool hard surface,
breathing deep the was and wasn't
the might have been
and the resounding
quiet,
breath shallow
in the face of
all of that stillness.
A million pounds of reverb
presses on my chest,
straining to hear
any last echo
of voices
now silent
paths not taken
moments when,
knowing
what is now
searingly clear,
might have turned
yesterday's tomorrow
into something other
than it is.
I try the doorknob,
quiet but firm,
desperate, even,
torquing my whole weight
against the portal which bars the way,
knowing it useless,
impossible,
foregone,
and yet still
eminently worth trying.
If only I could loose the catch
and step beyond
into yesterday
and spend
a few more minutes
with each of you,
the ones I loved
and who loved me,
could share secrets
of what came after
and catch those voices better
as they bounce just once more on my eardrums
like a man packing provisions
for a long lonely journey,
and seek the moment
where collectively
we hadn't yet
stumbled off the path
that had a future in it
and turned even the sky itself
against us.
I cannot strike the hinges
for they lie on the other side
where those echoes
faded and are still
and no one waits
to slip the catch
and let me seize the instant
when we took the
big fat planetary gamble
that now comes due.
Soon enough,
I know,
the quiet acceptance
of the perfect endless quiet
behind yesterday's door
must embrace me, too
and my silence
will harmonize
with the quiet therein,
saying nothing
of that which
cannot be changed.