Christina's Teapot

The only thing that remained

Was the fragile teapot,

Chipped and glued,

Filthy with memories of struggles

And babies born in the bed nearby.

The children raised and gone

Stare over their shoulders

For a lifetime

At shattered pasts.

Cautious sunlight fell 

From a window broken

On a day long done,

The guilty boot abandoned

As if shame and sorrow lay

In the burnt sienna field of wheat

Where the downward slope of their land

Stretched lazily beyond the door;

Beyond the ruined mantle,

And Christina.