Shades

It is an unsettling thing

To walk through the city

You grew up in,

For its bones remain

While the flesh

Has withered away

Or been remodeled

Into something unfamiliar.

As you walk along

Its tree-lined streets

The realization finally comes

That you are no longer welcome

In the schools you once attended

Or the playgrounds

That made up

The long summer days

Of childhood

For as time passes

You become as faded

As your memories

Left to haunt the places

You once called

Home.