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House where is your heart?
It blazes with warmth in the fireplace hearth,
But now lies dead in a cold ash bed as my family departs.

House where are your eyes?
It looks to where the future lies.
My windows once bright glazed and curtained
Stared on the blazing midsummer heat and winter's star-bright air.
Now are dirty broken window panes
On which rivulets of rain runs like tear stains,
A place where only silence reigns.

House where is your mouth?
They are my doors, north and south.
From these doors, back and front did I breath.
A welcoming threshold to the young and old is all I did need.
Whilst to youthful adventure, marriage, or to the churchyard,
I bid them leave.
Now my doors lie askew onto a weed and litter strewn view,
On which there seems no reprieve.

House where are your ears?
In each room was I attune to whispers, scandal and secret fears, over successive years.
Now my rooms lie cold and empty where now only damp and mould appears.

House where lies your soul?
In every brick and pore, pane and door, high ceiling to lowly floor
From chimney stack to my inner core where only a rat or mouse may gnaw.
There lies my soul, a  house that is whole.

House where is your past?
Deep in the bricks and timber whilst my structure lasts
Observing events both happy and sad.
The birth of a child or return of a war weary dad. 
Of sickness and ageing and the final demise
As a much loved grandma, life over, takes leave and dies.
To remember the laughter, their sad and joyful cries.
Now forlorn, I stand amid where a wilderness garden lies.

House, how was your birth?
From clay bricks and slate tiles was I born,
And trees that grew from the fertile earth. 
 
House what is your fate?
For new owners I must await,
But I pray it be soon, before it grows too late.
Less age and rot seals my fate.

People! Please don't ignore me,
But listen to my story,
And see what was once my glory.
Look kindly on me, you who stand before me.
Let your mind's eye see my splendour if you were to restore me. 
For I am house but also home,
I do not wish to dwell alone.
I am a refuge for those who roam.
I want once more to stand proud.
And hear the sound of someone cry out loud,
'Thank God I'm safely home.'
For I am house- a loving 'HOME.'
                                                		

Tags: sad, deep, hope,