The Probate Inventory: A Poem

 The Probate Inventory: A Poem

 

The court will ask for values:

of the house,

of the property,

of the old junkers rusting in the woods,

of the contents of every room.

What are they worth? Please itemize the value

Sifting through the forbidden folder of paperwork

That little Me was told not to touch.

  

What is the market value

Of my father’s pocket calendars,

one for every year since 1979.

Those tiny squares he recorded our lives:

what we had for dinner,

when we were sick,

the milestones,

the ordinary days. 

 

What is the market value for

A house crowded with things,

saved by parents of the Silent Generation

who never threw away anything still worth keeping?

Among the clutter,

There will be baby pictures,

forgotten notes,

pieces of lives hidden among the excess.

 

And what is the property worth?

The dogwood I climbed

Now tangled in leaves of three leave them be.

The iris and daffodils Dad rescued

still bloom where he planted them.

Those iris bulbs were Jack & Mary’s.

And now I’m thinking of their dog Krisco.

  

The old Metros may be worth scrap metal.

Dad kept them as reminders 

of his son’s journeys.

He loved the Vibe

a gift from his daughter.

He saved things

because the stories attached to them.

 

This afternoon,

While going through papers,

I found the scent of home.

Dust.

Ink.

Aging paper.

My mother was there.

My father was there.

  

Tomorrow I will file the inventory,

listing every asset of the estate.

But the inheritance that matters most

will never appear in probate:

a father’s handwriting,

a mother’s photographs,

and the unmistakable smell

of being loved.