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Middle House with the Red Door
by Ashini J. Desai

We chose red for the front door.
Until then, we had chosen only neutrals
because we did not know how to paint our future.
Feng Shui says red is good luck and our door faced a good direction.

We were not ready to own a house, but we wanted the door to be red.
Not the In-Your-Face-Sour-Maraschino-Cherry-Candy Red,
but one that was a radiant cranberry during the day
and a warmer merlot under the porch lights.

Twenty years passed since we built the house.
The door has opened and closed many times.
With every knock or doorbell, we peek through the white curtains
just to tell them “we’re coming” as we try to open the tricky lock.

We’ve peered at jovial faces of family, friends, and neighbors;
the much-welcomed carpenters, painters, and plumbers;
and the surprise knocks of evangelicals, sales and political canvassers      who found our house.

The door opened for the moms with pink princesses for playdates and
later teenagers parading in and out, posing in sparkly prom dresses,
and sneaking out the morning after sleepovers.

My parents used to appear with arms brimming with bags and treats.
Later they called ahead to open the garage so
my father wouldn’t have far to walk.
Last year, I opened the door to fill the bird feeder
for the red cardinal pecking on our windows and doors
after my father passed away.

The door protected us through hurricanes and blizzards
where the snow stacked high against the door.
During the quarantine, we remember to open the door
to check for the deliveries that
we can’t touch…just…yet.

Feng Shui says red is for good luck.
When the house was built, we did not know
the door would open to such colorful memories.

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: It was quite a challenge to edit this poem, since there were so many directions this could take, and it was the first time I’ve written a tribute to my house.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Ashini J. Desai, a co-founder of Dandelion Revolution Press,  balances creative writing with family and a technology management career. Her poems have been published in anthologies, including Cities, Overplay/Underdone, as well as River Poets Journal, Philadelphia Poets, Thema, plus the Asian-American anthologies, Word Masala 2011 and Yellow as Turmeric, Fragrant as Cloves. Her essays appear in the Nancy Drew Anthology (Silver Birch Press, 2016) and Labor Pains and Birth Stories. She has written poetry and book reviews for South Asian-centric websites. Her short story appears in the Not Quite As You Were Told anthology, Visit her at  dandelionrevolutionpress.wordpress.com.