Handle With Care

The table beckons with its holiday feast,
Christmas stockings decking a black iron railing;
an evergreen overflowing with gifts and toys
...in a room once filled with laughter and noise.
Shadows of yesterday haunt me with its plaintive call,
fate reigns triumphant in life's fickle flight,
and time wings without warning, unraveling, incessant
...as day into night.

It's Christmas again, the beginning anew,
our table is set...tho' only for two;
the room less festive yet lain out as before,
and a tree dazzling and splendid--but gifts are few.
Two Christmas stockings now hang with a gallant bravado,
while our children build memories with families of their own,
"Savor each memory--mark Handle with care,"
...for the time when, they too...will be only a pair.

by: Elizabeth