something left behind

I had walked, with my son,

along the pier to where we stopped

for it struck me – odd:

the ashen gray deck post hacked 

with incised slices and slashes 

and scratches – the woebegone scars 

of dragon claw clashes – 

gouged in timber and left: it seemed 

so that ragged “y” and rakish “c” 

would moil on, well after death. 

not very enlightened thinking, I thought – 

stuff rots – as I cast my own wish

and, picking up a pebble from 

the wooden boards I stood upon . . . 

tossed it, as far as I could 

out into the sea – where – 

it plopped to the bottom of the briny depths.

we both smiled, then, as we strolled away 

knowing there was something left behind

because . . . I put it there.
  

“To live in hearts we leave behind is not to die.”

Scottish Poet, Thomas Campbell

note:  posted for Poets United.

photo:  Rocky Point Pier in Port Moody - W. Bourke

© 2015 Wendy Bourke