You loved her, didn’t you, Theodora?

But she wanted a married man,

your Eleanor,

so all you could do was attack,

a little insult, a little joke, a little violence,

and just try to get close to her.

Hill House and Hugh Crain

hardly made for a romantic atmosphere:

the moving, echoing pounding,

and the all-pervading cold

you felt each time a dead fucker

decided to wake up.

Still you wooed her the only way

you knew how;

you put up with her anger,

her innocence,

never forgot that time on the stone balcony,

when she called you unnatural,

and the fact that she would kill

for just a chance in bed

with Dr. Markway.

You got to sleep next to her, once,

but she was frightened and drunk

and left your warmth for the couch

and the ghost squeezing her hand,

and the madness that she spoke to herself,

inside her mind.

When she died under the same tree

as the first Mrs. Crain,

you regarded it as partially your fault.

All you had as your love arrows

were a little insult, a little joke, a little violence.

It wasn’t enough to take her home

to seashores, and sunshine,

and little fights, surely,

but also, life