The Room

This a a response to a prompt from HVR, which can be found here.

I wasn’t actually sure how to go about it. I can scribble a decent music review and the poetry is going ok, but I’m not sure I am able to craft an interesting piece as a story, which leads to this; a mish-mash of words, which has a narrative, though I think isn’t quite story or poem.

The room looked empty, devoid of life
and so it had been, these last 15 years.
The walls still showing an aged colour-scheme.
remnants of old bedding strewn in places.

The sides of each, flanked by
old metal bed frames,
no mattresses or softness of
any kind, live here.

Despite offering impressive views
of mighty trees in the woodland
that surrounded it,
the property, like the room, stood abandoned.

If bricks and mortar could emit a
death rattle, the sound would be
something akin to how this place looked.
Neglect, coating the plaster and wood.

It has had a few views over the years,
though all come to naught.
People see the bedframes
and almost immediately turn from it.

Maria though, she is different.
She entered the building,
breathed in the rot and damp
as though appraising fine wine.

She didn’t seem upset by
the disrepair around her.
Cracked walls, creaking floor,
she asked to be shown in fact,

to the ‘room with the bedframes’.
The man from the property firm
was taken aback. He usually
kept that until the end,

was actually thinking of trying to skip it.

Maria insisted on it being the first stop
and requested to enter alone,
which was met with surprise,
but did she also detect relief?

Finally they went up a small staircase,
along a corridor, which smelt
a mixture of wet dog, off milk
and something between sweat and excrement.

White-painted walls had turned
cream, below the layers of dust
which coated them.
The door stood before her.

It was in a similar state to the walls,
though the small brass handle
seemed unnaturally clean
as if recently polished.

Maria slowly opened the
door, stepped inside, unaccompanied.
A slight tremor in her lips
the only sign of trepidation.

She slowly closed the door.
It shut with a click, and what
seemed like a whispered wail.
Then silence that felt like a pulse.

Light from outside was the only illumination,
She tightly closed her eyes against it
as an aroma of rotting flesh and ammonia
seemed to rise up from the floors.

Behind her eyelids she saw children,
almost wholly in shadow.
Playing one moment and
then not, the next.

Silhouetted-games replaced
by panicked rushing,
exploding skulls and blood,
splattering the walls all around.

An almost unbearable sound
filled her head. Screams
and what seemed like clawing
against both brick and pine.

She was sure that the beds were
shaking, metal frames, making
an almighty clashing, crashing sound,
which ended as abruptly as it began.

Eyes now opened, and all was as
before. Messy, neglected, though
she now realised what lay behind
the run-down nature of the room.

Stepping out, she immediately
indicated an eagerness to purchase
the property, which drew a look
of open-mouthed surprise.

She simply smiled and said,

“this will do nicely,
my ghosts need some playmates”.

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