this is our house.

On the mouldering façade of the house, the once intricate tracings of ivy have grown into a thick fur.
But even those resilient green tendrils have begun to wither away...

This is our house.
This is where we make a semblance of life.
This is where the atmosphere integrates decaying, whispered confidences with a shivering solitude.
This is where gravestones grow overnight, quietly and effortlessly like ghoulish mushrooms.

We might as well deliberately cultivate weeds in our garden since all that grows there is a poisonous regret that chokes anything else that tries to develop.
{Vindictive thorn pricks with no rose to alleviate the sting.}

The sun shines everywhere but never seems to penetrate the haze we linger in.
All we see of the sunbeams are the shadowed bruises that trail behind them.
{For all our inner fog we might as well live in darkness.}

Ghosts inhabit these walls, to be sure.
We live in a wary submission to the company of these in a phantasmal beings.
{Often I wonder which will crumble first, this house or this family.
And if we were gone... would the ghosts cease to be?}

This is our house.
We live here because we must.
We live here because we cannot forget.

{Picture found here.}

My Favourite Place

"This," she told her little brother, "is a treasure map!"
Her little brother eyed the tattered piece of paper doubtfully and complacently continued playing with his toy cars.
Unruffled by his disinterest, she continued. "At the end of this map you will find a door... a door that leads to all of my favourite places!
How would you like to go through a wardrobe to a beautiful land where animals talk! We could take Fritz with us and he could tell us what he is thinking!"
By now, her brother had abandoned his toys and was regarding the paper she held with curiosity.
"We could step through a looking glass, even! And be pieces on a giant game of chess! Or we could go to Dictionopolis and eat the very words we say. If we get too full we could go to Digitopolis and eat subtraction stew which makes you hungry instead of full!"
Her little brother's face broke into a smile that was parenthesised by two dimples.
"Oh! Wait," she gasped, "I know where we could go first! A place called Neverland! You get there by flying and you can never get older there, never ever. They have pirates there and indians and fairies and everything! Oh, yes! Let's go there first!" She almost shrieked, hopping up and down with exuberance. "Do you want to?" She asked earnestly peering into the little boy's widened eyes. He nodded vigorously.
"Well, then, off we go!!" She slipped her hand in his and swinging their arms they set off together down that well-worn path... the path that leads to the library.

{Painting: The Land of Enchantment by Norman Rockwell.}

An E.J.B. Poem

 











She dried her tears and they did smile
To see her cheeks' returning glow
How little dreaming all the while
That full heart throbbed to overflow

With that sweet look and lively tone
And bright eye shining all the day
They could not guess at midnight lone
How she would weep the time away 

~Emily Jane Brontë

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{I have been writing a lot this week. More than I have in a long time. I stayed up till 1 AM last night working on one of my stories. It is rather strange that I have had such an outpouring of thoughts since I'm also being plagued by self-doubts. They rear their ugly heads every now and then. Oh, how I wish I knew a spell to oust them! So, consequently, nothing I write seems to measure up to some obscure standard I've set. I can never decide if self-imposed standards are beneficiary or just stifling...}
{Picture by and of me.}