As I sit here in this class surrounded by the usual humdrum of teachers and students, I reminisce on the days in my aunt’s backyard. I reminisce on how it felt to simply lay on the lush soft grass with her dog. I remember how the wind would blow and carry the sound of the wind chimes swinging in the tree. How I content I was with this yard. Even in a storm or winter snow, it was still a sense of beautiful peace to me. I grew up in this yard. It was the place where I made my first friends. Where I learned to swim. This place was my soul’s home, my center. I sit here in class staring at memories outside the window. I sit here in class wishing I was there in those memories. But that place is not the same anymore. The grass is no longer lush and soft, it is brittle and decaying. The yard is empty. The dog is no longer living and neither is my aunt.

This place I love is

sad and empty now, like

   her husband that lives there.