Foundation
March 9 2022
The house shifts a little
as the seasons change.
I notice how the windows stick,
the small gap
between the door and the frame.
It's not the foundation settling,
because by now
it should be firmly seated.
It's more a kind of restlessness,
as if the house couldn’t get comfortable
and kept squirming in its chair.
I find this disturbing.
As if the ground under our feet
was unreliable,
the house I depend on
less solid than I thought.
Is this how it feels
to survive an earthquake?
As if from then on
nothing can ever be certain
or worthy of trust?
The floors creak,
drywall nails
migrate out from the walls.
And when she'll part with it,
the dog's ball
rolls into the corner
all by itself.
The fridge cycles on,
and the intrusive hum
makes the house sound alive;
an imperceptibly slow-moving creature
living a parallel life
on its own scale of time.
Who doesn't bother to notice
I live here as well.
No comments:
Post a Comment