Rosemary

The house just down the wooded path
erupted in flames last week,
the inferno set by the brother
the arsonist
the murderer
who visited Rosemary there
for the first time
in nearly ten years.

He knocked on the door,
I imagine,
said hello sister
how you doin',
then killed her
and her loyal dogs
with his brand new
purchased-for-the-occasion
shotgun.

I walk there everyday now
along that pristine wooded path
linking our two homes,
feeding her fish as they rise
in the pond she built,
picking the vegetables
from her raised beds,
adding flowers to the vase,
and checking her hummer feeder.

But that's not really why.

I wander
soundlessly
along that path
to feel the air
to taste the pain
to drown in the terror
of that night

all alone

as she was

as he most certainly was.