Ellie May Was Never Here

You knock where no door should be,

the porch sagging like a breath held too long.

That gate—red as blood or barnwood

after rain— moans Ellie’s name,

though the wind won’t own it.

Only the hush. Only the hush.

She was stitched into silence,

a name whittled into splinters,

left in hollow trees

and burnt hymnals.

You feel her—don’t you?—

pressed between floorboards,

nestled in the cradle—

no child ever rocked.

Ask the preacher’s wife—she won’t say.

Ask the crows—they’ve seen her

planting corn for ghosts—

in the darkening field.

Ask the wind chime

hanging on a nail—

it only stirs,

when you forget to breathe.

Once, they say, she lit candles

in mason jars for those—

who never made it home.

Now she is the jar, and you?

You’re the moth!

Burning its wings on someone else’s memory.

Turn back, hearer!

Before the hillside learns your name.

Before the fog lifts and you find—

she’s always been behind you.