Ghost in the Room

My response to dVerse Poets Pub Poetics – Room With or Without a View

 

My five year old self sits on the toilet,

The door open on the short landing

Peopled by shadows from the skylight;

At the end of the twilight,

The room behind the closed door.

In the sunlight

That escapes from the keyless lock,

Dust motes

Float.

I watch and tremble,

Torn between the monster in the plumbing

Coming

Up

From below

And the unknown

Behind the door.

I never pulled the chain,

Believing that the roar

Of water would awaken

A ghost in that room.

 

In the winter,

My grandmother’s house was icy cold

And the bathroom held the added terror

Of a paraffin heater,

It’s overwhelming stink

And the wavy lines of heat

Warming;

A warning

To keep the bogeyman at bay.

 

And then one day,

The door to the room was open,

Its secrets laid bare:

A broken chair,

Worn cushions,

A battered brown case,

Full of old ladies underwear,

Pinafores and canvas shoes,

Remnants of my great grandmother,

The wizened ghost we visited every Sunday

In a different room,

Locked in dementia.

 

© Kim M. Russell, 2016

 

25 thoughts on “Ghost in the Room”

  2. Oh, my….Kim. This was GOOD, really good. All of the details you added heightened the mood as I worked my way through. A five-year-old sees many bogeymen….and, indeed, the scariest would be a person locked in dementia.

    I remember an uncle. Oh, I didn’t like visiting him at all, but my mother always brought me along to the hospital where he was always talking a lot of nonsense. My mother entered into his nonsense with him & talked with him as if what he was saying was real. A very creative approach, I thought.

    Sorry the link had closed. DO share this at Open Link in a few hours…..

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  6. That ending took me by surprise Kim ~ I admire the progression of fear, bogeyman, and finally learning the secrets of the room, the grandmother with dementia ~ Really well done with the room prompt ~

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