I walk my way back home,
clutched by a handle too familiar in my palms.
I press it down, expecting the swing of wood,
the sudden rush of white-washed walls welcoming me home.
But it will not budge.
I nudge and nudge for minutes in the quiet,
annoyed by the sudden stubbornness of iron,
swifting and swaying my words upon the lock-
blind to the truth held tight in my own hand.
There has been too much dust on the road back.
Spiders have infiltrated the margins,
weaving their silk as if the walls were theirs alone.
The lock is choked with orange rust;
the key cannot help, I whisper,
convincing my guilty heart a lie.
My little fingers fret around the metal,
scouring the scale until the red flakes
fall heavy onto my feet.
Pledged guilty. The fault was always mine.
Through the glass, my favorite books stare back,
innocent and waiting.
I grumble at the glass, reaching out
to cut their hearts in two.
They do not bleed-paper stays white-but I do.
I cavil upon the days of my life,
blaming the roof, the spoon, the ticking clock;
any excuse to prove it wasn’t my mistake
to leave the hobby that defined me.
And with a sudden force-
I jam the key, cluttering it right and left,
until the mechanism yields.
A sharp, definitive click.
The book is in my hands.
The white-washed walls sing their praise.
I clear the dust, clutching the pages tight
against my broken, mended heart -
for an apology to the paper was indeed needed
The Rusted Key in My Hands
