Home

A simple structure at first glance is more complex at heart. Strike chords, brick against beating flesh, as our rushed minds grasp memories. The height etchings on the kitchen door frame, And the pang of jealousy as I look upon them; nothing much has changed. The bleak bone-white of spotlight vinyl. Appointment notes and insurance policies hang from the fridge like sixties decor. We remember through young minds the childish taboo of the basement, The ghostly groans of the boiler as the central heating turns on. We run up the stairs, your long clumsy legs still more capable and I - do you remember? - Jump on Mr. Creaky like we used to do together and your feet shuffle through boxes of forgotten memories - cyclops dolls and limbless soldiers we insisted on keeping because it made made our war games seem realistic. Just like the secret embarrassing photos of us in each other's clothes, Hidden under the floorboards in the bedroom for a decade. The solid blanket that is our home, will we regret leaving it? Will our kids relate to the dent in the freezer when we fought over the last chocolate ice-cream cone? They'll never know the spot in the garden where we planted our first life, marked only by unseen glimpses in minds of our treasured memories and by 15 paces up by 3 right. Just like the dank mustiness of the airing cupboard marked our clothes and whispered into mum's nostrils that we were hiding on there again, And the house laughing at us as she threatened to lock us on there forever.