Empty Houses

Empty houses silent and still they stand
where gardens ever pretty with their thorns
tend to stories untold in unspoken silence
as mother and child pretend to make-believe
that everything is going to be alright
that nothing is really, really wrong at all.

Empty houses mad with their masquerade
where mother and child dance and play, playing house
putting on that good face smiling right through their tears
trying to paint that faerie tale, it picture perfect in every detail
so that all the neighbors far and near may never ever suspect,
that something... anything might be awry or out of sorts.

Empty houses where hallow haunts of dreams play on and on and on
where mother and child hollow like shells sit, waiting... listening...
each and every heartbeat that thunders in their chest...
each and every breath that bellow and roar they hear
though ocean tempest tides crashing upon some distant shore,
there they arm in arm cradling back and forth, back and forth,
whisper prayers, dreaming themselves far, far, far away
trying to drown out their tears in the roar of the storm
that waits and baits them every hour of the day.

Empty houses casting long shadows across the way,
where silhouettes cast against windows with shades drawn down
that would be less than child play...
where daunting doors beaten and battered crimson red
that would be ever vigilant with their watch stare them down
keeping secrets locked away behind their eyes
where memories and thoughts of things that should not be
play over and over again and again,
never wanting, never letting mother or child to forget .

Empty houses, ever silent... ever still...
fragile and desperate like a house of cards they stand
'Whisper little one, whisper, don't breathe too hard.'
the mother to child tells 'or it just may all come tumbling, tumbling down.'
'Whisper little one, whisper and promise to never kiss and tell.'