In spring she moves
from her old space underground
to the stairs curving
straight to the attic door.
Her path strewn with books,
books falling past her and before her,
books bearing foreign names
dark smudges stuck to the words
wrinkled from bath water and tears.
Carrying her bundle of belongings,
she feels her way
through the blind air
that presses her gently
back into hiding but she will stop
and listen and then
sleepwalk outside.
Whose howling makes her drop
on wet grass and hold the weight
of trees against the night glow?
In the attic, finally,
she paints all the corners white
still the spiders hide
like seeds scattered
from a drunken hand.
Dreaming,
she will lie against the right side of the bed
picking feebly at the words from her sleepwalk
hearing the stories her mother told
on the nights neither could sleep.
She tap-dances on her own bed
of coals.
And she, and I with her,
want to know this:
What may we embrace in winter
when the sun drops small to that far horizon?
Oh it is fitting
to live in this decrepit Victorian
cornered with dust
and always sad in February.
