01-10-2013, 09:09 AM
"Standing alone in my old house, residents carried away by cancer, yet still their presence remains in each coat of paint and flowerbed, all now partly concealed by my much needed indifference. The home is bare, stripped back to its shell, except for the ghosts of old furniture that appear, just for a second, as I enter each room.
I’m supposed to feel sad, it's just me and my brother now. We’ll split the money and never speak again but that doesn’t bring sadness. I stare out over aged gardens and contemplate my loss. Many times I have wept at the feet of my own forced memories, the self-torture that brings tears for company, but that is not why I want to shout. Losing family is painful, but a severed link to childhood is barren by comparison and I fear one will compound the other; such a loss makes me tremble inside.
I move on, a giant looking into shrunken bedrooms and gloomy hallways; too many tiny details fill my eyes, viewed like shards of glass from a broken vase, which I'm trying to reassemble. Each piece is an image: places I once played games, a soundbite from a past conversation, the odours of wet dog and washing days or doors opened and slammed shut. The glass cuts at my chest making it hard to breathe.
I place my hand on the wall to check for a heartbeat. Can it be that traces of lost childhood are captured in the fabric of a room, dwell in wooden handles of old tools or crayon scribblings trapped behind wallpaper? Can it be that if we close our eyes and breathe in the essence of childhood haunts then chemistry alone can unlock memories once keyless and forgotten? And in doing so can you retrieve something so precious it can twist your body, crumple your face and turn sobs into shouts. I’m shouting now as I slide down the wall; I felt its beat before pulling away.
Such places can be found in most of our footsteps and if you know how to look they can almost be touched. But my other places do not compare to this home, I could linger here for an eternity, drifting as a child, growing on thought and melancholy, surviving on smiles and laughter unlocked from memories.
I cannot linger, the house is sold to the highest bidder. I have offered up my most prized possession, my touch-stone, my portal, for a pocket full of gold. Now when I need to look, how can I return to these places that hold me in their essence, that tell my story? Who now will listen to the beating fabric of my old home?"
I’m supposed to feel sad, it's just me and my brother now. We’ll split the money and never speak again but that doesn’t bring sadness. I stare out over aged gardens and contemplate my loss. Many times I have wept at the feet of my own forced memories, the self-torture that brings tears for company, but that is not why I want to shout. Losing family is painful, but a severed link to childhood is barren by comparison and I fear one will compound the other; such a loss makes me tremble inside.
I move on, a giant looking into shrunken bedrooms and gloomy hallways; too many tiny details fill my eyes, viewed like shards of glass from a broken vase, which I'm trying to reassemble. Each piece is an image: places I once played games, a soundbite from a past conversation, the odours of wet dog and washing days or doors opened and slammed shut. The glass cuts at my chest making it hard to breathe.
I place my hand on the wall to check for a heartbeat. Can it be that traces of lost childhood are captured in the fabric of a room, dwell in wooden handles of old tools or crayon scribblings trapped behind wallpaper? Can it be that if we close our eyes and breathe in the essence of childhood haunts then chemistry alone can unlock memories once keyless and forgotten? And in doing so can you retrieve something so precious it can twist your body, crumple your face and turn sobs into shouts. I’m shouting now as I slide down the wall; I felt its beat before pulling away.
Such places can be found in most of our footsteps and if you know how to look they can almost be touched. But my other places do not compare to this home, I could linger here for an eternity, drifting as a child, growing on thought and melancholy, surviving on smiles and laughter unlocked from memories.
I cannot linger, the house is sold to the highest bidder. I have offered up my most prized possession, my touch-stone, my portal, for a pocket full of gold. Now when I need to look, how can I return to these places that hold me in their essence, that tell my story? Who now will listen to the beating fabric of my old home?"
If your undies fer you've been smoking through em, don't peg em out
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