Red Eternal

He hasn’t been around lately;

but I still see

his shadow on the wall, the dirt

from his shoes on the mat in front

of the door. So I vacuum

the mat.

Scrub the walls with bleach, then paint them

red.

White just doesn’t stand

the test of time. Red however, is

eternal. Red is anger and war and – love?

Anger. War. Love.

The three unified in their

eternity.

Anger is,

war is,

love is – eternal.

Now with the mat at my door clean,

with anger, war

and love surrounding me, I

know he will return. This time there will be

fingerprints on the light switches

and dog-eared pages in my favorite book

of poems.