o waiapu

sometimes i dream of you

and I take a trip by on google maps to see how you are

it is ten years ago this year and i thought i left the panic behind back then

crying in your kitchen as everyone with more power than i had made all the decisions

to give you away.

sometimes i saw ghosts in the bathroom.

there probably weren’t any but

i was just fourteen, but i loved how you smelled

of varnished wood and glorious angles, dust and rusted bedsprings.

people slept upstairs once, did you know?

I could never muster the desire to go up there and try

felt a little too much like vertigo when i stared down at the floor below

wondering if that was what it felt like to look into the abyss.

the carpet in the sleeping room smelled sharp and new

it bounced too, when i jumped on it

i once pretended to be a murderer in a dystopia of my own making

posed for over-exposed photos on my new camera

they went nowhere, really

but in the background all there was was your varnished wall of chopped orange and dusty wood

the river wasn’t ours technically but we still played with it

running across the dangerous bridge and the really dangerous one,

rolling in the grass.

i once got poison ivy from you

a tiny brush spreading hives all across my palms

a spicy sharp hot pain

guess this is why you don’t climb under houses.

now you are manicured, with polite fruit trees

and the brightest coat of paint.

somehow the fence seems shorter.

one day i will buy you back.