THE NOISE THAT THE HOUSE MADE
the noise the bedroom made was her numb
determination/ as she hacksawed their
marital bed in two/ she said: he can't
hurt my feelings because i haven't got
any/ so that each stale half rested
quietly & separately/ growing cobwebs
like wrinkles/
the noise was a four-year-
old girl afraid of the dark/ the long
whine from the blankets all night: mum
i wanna drink of water/ until even after
she had stopped calling out/ the hallway
walls sighed: oohhh we wanna drink of
water/ as though they were thirsty/
despite the financial tears they were
built on/
the noise my brother made as
he shuffled his cot towards the door was
hyperactive/ his screwed up red face &
fist curled tightly around the bottle
of cow's milk/ lactose storms splashing
the blue walls of tantrums/
the noise is
my father pissed/ falling into the
swimming pool/ filled with green algae
& mosquito larva/ gulping down water
beneath the warped clothesline/ & jumping
up so my mother would notice him/ her
sharp face covered in mock icing from
the sunbeam/
irritated by him indulging
in slime/ after pushing out the cupcakes
she scrubbed the kitchen clean/ the
noise is a wet plop as a fish leapt to
freedom/ slamming eye first into grey
speckled lino/ found by my mother a few
days later/ dried like prune & covered
in dog hair/
the noise that the house
made was the murder of childhood/ the
cold fist appeared in the silence of the
hallway/ from the midst of the blue
walls & paint-chipped skirting boards/
children's heads collided & cracked like
thunder/ before dissolving into grief &
deep carpet tumults/
(once i bumped my
forehead on the sharp corner of a
cupboard/ so that my mother would rub
oily yellow butter into the huge purple
lump)/ (then another time i broke the
light in the refrigerator door & was
beaten by her/ until i jogged like a
ragged doll in her skinny white arms/
her tears mingling with mine as my toes
tap danced the carpet)/
children hit
the floorboards like stones with bruised
thighs & upper arms/(my father was a
detective who witnessed the corpses of
parents/ shocked toddlers sitting beside
them/ fried eggs sliding down the walls
in trails of grease/ cold omelettes & pools
of crimson disappearing into cracks
beneath the broken porcelain)/
the noise
is black flies glued to the ceilings &
footsteps down corridors & overturned
refrigerators flooding the kitchen with
grocery liquids/ & brooding houses built
with bricks of regret on unstable
foundations/ with torn 1960s wiredoor
flyscreens & broken-down trampolines/
& a stray ginger tom who no one has told
to move on/ only the goldfish sedated in
the bowl & the budgie in the cage were
left silently observing/ & the turtle &
rabbit were very quiet/ when my father
took down the smith & wesson/ he cried
in the backyard sandpit/ like a child
witnessed by no one | 
