Overnight Stay

 

“Time for bed” they said,

In a front room warmed by coal fire licks

Where the red and orange and white flames

Danced patterns on the walls of falling dusk

They push, cajole, entice you to the stairs

And do not notice terror tears welling in your eyes

 

Fourteen steps up the narrow stairwell

Tracing fingers on a pale wallpaper wall

Festooned with ornate pastel roses

To the landing at the top to pause

And pluck up courage to move on

Down the dimly lit corridor to the left

 

A bedroom door is open on the right

A bed stripped of its bedclothes

Lying naked in the weak moonlight

That limps in through the curtained window

Boxes piled around it in chaotic lines

That indicate the sparseness of a spare room

 

A grandfather clocks chats ominously in the dark

Of my grandparent’s room

Halfway down the terror tunnel

That leads to where the demons plan their strategies

For unwary children come to stay

And tarry in the white witch’s lair

 

The door croaks, not creaks, a welcome

To the midnight room cloaked in heavy curtains

Bejewelled in dark brown ancient furniture

The bed a giant trap of eiderdown and flannelette

That will grip you in its unforgiving grasp

As soon as your eyes shut, and they will

 

You lie there, little boy,

Counting the tick and the tock

And far away a heavy chime

Rattles out a warning

That the night has just begun

And will last forever