Kristen McLaughlin

They Were Made Centuries Ago

Skeletons of giants
Rise up in front of you
Bones of pine and birch
Planks mottled with age
And rodent infestations
Grey green moss the colour of the swamp
Grows out of the empty windows
And broken doors
Like barnacles on a whale,
Hiding, masking, changing.

Barley whispers in waves
Softens the sharp edges
Of the behemoths
With its fuzzy bristles
Muting the pains of age
That appear starker
With harvest and snow.

You wonder of their lives
The people who pieced them together
Hewn logs fitted like nestled lovers
Those who nurtured them
Whispered to their walls to stay strong
To curve with the wind
To battle the frost
To protect them.

Axe marks sink deeply into their skin.
Killing and creating.
To some people they are
Just old barns
Standing in hollow fields
To you they are stalwart
Silent proof of time and its movement
Dying in their very bones
As they collapse slowly
Into dust.

Kristen McLaughlin is an emerging poet born in Grande Prairie, Alberta, Canada, who has also lived in the mountains of Vancouver, BC, where she pursued an undergraduate degree in archaeology. She currently resides in Toronto, Ontario, where she has recently finished her master’s degree in museum studies. Kristen is the owner of her own wedding and lifestyle photography business, Golden Birch Photography. She enjoys road trips, plants, and drinking coffee outside in new places.