Moving House - J. Neil Garcia

The hardest part about moving house
is not being able to move
memory.
It stakes its all
ramrod straight into living room floor,
nooses itself around banister,
and yields nothing to the breathless budge
away from bedroom post,
kitchen window,
brickbrown wall, or marble nick
on sink and badly chipped tile
in bathroom.
Afflicted with motion-sickness,
it will not travel well.
And so one moves with all one can:
personal computer, impersonal bed,
stereo and television set,
perishable items
of books, poems, days,
and clothes one wears
upon one’s back.
And one can only look back
to memory’s dimly lit house
where childhood first grew eyes and ears
and never really learned
to use them properly.
Where the boy who lived
in a closet all his life,
knew all about how one should never
lose faith in things
one most loves,
and yet
wide-eyed and breathless
still packed his bags
and left.