Progression

If walls could talk,

Oh the tales they'd have to tell

From heavenly realms

To pits of hell

And everything - EVERYTHING - in between.

If walls could talk

They'd tell the clock

To STOP it's incessant ticking

Painfully picking out each note in time while I remain

trapped between this floor and ceiling,

Revealing, concealing

A place to hang your art and photographs

Where once I saw a woman sawed in half

Yet I couldn't look away...oh the horror from which I'll never recover

For no one - BUT NO ONE - ever asks me how I feel

As coffee and whiskey and vomit splatter across me

And spiders and beetles and cockroaches crawl upon me for a better view

All the while the fly, buzz buzz buzzzzzing around and using me as a landing strip

Some free hotel for the night, lest he fall prey to the spider's bite:

I watch them sometimes for fun, you know, just to see who'll win the battle...

Most often the spider, of course, as he paralyzes his victim

And spins him stealthily into a sachet for later,

Liquefying him, and sucking him down like a smoothie...

Mmmmmm...delicious, I'm sure.

I've seen them do meth and cocaine and scream out in pain

When they couldn't score their fix

And then I've taken my licks for their frustration

Kicked in, and punched out for their mental degradation

On their unwanted vacation, yet I keep my station still...

The landlord will patch me up before the next set of degenerates move in.

Oh how I miss the days of old

This used to be a place of peace and tranquility

Of happiness and prosperity

Music would play on the gramophone, and they'd dance and they'd whisper sweetly when they were all alone, and then came the kiss that led to...

Well, it would be wrong of me to witness a kiss - a night like this - and tell.

But tell it did in time, and two were fast becoming three

And years later, three became four and five

And the place was alive with the sounds of happiness and lovin'

With something always in the oven making the air smell oh so sweet

And the sounds of those little feet, pitter pattering their way into my heart

Tickled pink, I was, when they adorned me with art,

Sometimes a painting hung by a proud mama,

Sometimes graffiti directly on me, to which father rebelled,

While mother withheld her tears as she dutifully scrubbed my surface clean

In her pink, lace-lined apron, and beautiful red kitten heels.

Christmases with trees and lights and candy cane delights

While presents piled up under the boughs, and I had a front seat to it all

I thought these days would last forever

Little know did I know of their endeavor to buy a larger home for their expanding brood, as five was fast becoming six,

And then they were gone...children's laughter and the beloved pitter patter

Replaced with a quiet man of some authority

Who kept to himself, while a bottle on the shelf seemed to be is only comfort at all

Until one night he took a bad fall, and bumped his head on the way down...

it was weeks before they found his bloated, fly infested corpse.

No more smells of baking bread, just this man who now was dead

Thank God they took him away - I couldn't have stared at him for another day...

Time just changed everything, you know?

Neighbors weren't neighborly like they were before

People kept to themselves and locked their doors

Crime and violence came to our neck of the woods.

Where once stood hard working, honest men

Were thugs, and thieves making heroin dens...

Say good bye to the American dream - say hello to hellfire and screams...

Unbelievable.

What are you doing? Oh God, no - hunter green? I can't be seen like this.

No, no no, miss - gold crown molding? Have you lost your mind?

These people must be fucking blind, I swear...

Fuck it. I don't care anymore. I'm slated for demolition in 2024.

Freedom, sweet freedom - maybe next time, I'll be the floor.