over-shoulder weather

over-shoulder weather

 13  09/17/2025

a tale of the unforgiven

 

 

I’ve walked the length of my sentence

long after the gates unlatched,

counting the gravel underfoot

as if each stone might still accuse.

 

The years have grown moss over my name,

but transgression carved into memory’s vestibule

means there is always one chair turned away,

its back carved with the shape of my absence.

 

I’ve mended the fence,

stitched the torn sleeve,

poured water into the roots I once scorched-

but the wind still carries

a syllable I cannot unhear.

 

So I move,

but not without the weight of glancing-

a pilgrim with a mirror in his pack,

catching the ghost of my own retreat.

 

And forward is a road

that keeps folding back on itself,

a loop of weathered timber and raindark stone,

where even the horizon

wears my shadow like a borrowed coat,

and the door I step through

is always the same vestibule.

 

 

 

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Reviews

[Soren]

A most wonderful poem that in its imagery sends many messages. It has a feel of melancholy and darkness. Such great imagery unfolds in its lines. It seems a pilgrimage with no end in sight. I must apologize for not having read or responded to your poems lately but I have not been able to get on this site to post of respond to others until today. I keep getting server problem responses. Hope they don't continue and will try to catch up.

[redd Brick Keshner]

Same here. The site’s been bothersome has been down for such a long time. Catch ups will be an adventure for sure🙏🏻🕊️

[John the Baptist]

Exceptional imagery in this one. It tells us the difficulty involved in releasing the past, which seems sometimes to resist release. The last stanza informs us of the challenge that faces the speaker.

[keith]

always the one with masterful adverb/adjective prose
how do you do it redd?
i must admit the title drew me in ... over the shoulder indeed

this my friend is why you are a gatekeeper of this here wooord salad!
never hurts to hang out in the shadows of the great!
KOOL BEANS FRIEND KOOL BEANS!

[redd Brick Keshner]

A lot of sleepless nights and stolen moments, furtive scribbling and overthinking 🙏🏻🕊️