‘Abode’ or ‘Lair’

“We bring our lares with us” – Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space

Where do you live? they ask-

I gesture towards my house across the street

By this they mean ‘Abode’ or ‘Lair’,

For Sale sign still impaling the front lawn

the place I rest my head. Where ‘Bed’ is.

We just moved in last night, I say. Slept on a mattress

Because where we sleep (we dream), there

on the floor, no furniture, moonlight streaming in,

we most frankly are? Where nails have torn

our clothes, damp, hanging on the banister. Our breaths

into the walls, where skin, once shed, has nestled

clouds, filigree in cold air (we have no heating yet) escaping

into the cracks and body fused with brick

and it reminded me of camping

we live there and everywhere else we simply-

under the stars, out in the wild woods

float? Deflated spectres, suspended and diffuse,

and how exhilarating I found it as a child

uncontained without four walls, foundations, roof?

to be feral for a night or two.

Until we return, Home Again! and we recompose

Tomorrow the moving van will come

moulding our selves, retracting into the niches

And we will find a place for all our things.