In this house, laden
with wood that creaks
louder with every step, matted
with grass and fur, reeking
of smoke that curls
up from the fireplace,
the boy tucked his feet
under the corner of the couch
and flipped through countless pages.
One day he wrote pages of his own
and he did not return to the house,
not even to babble with the brook,
or swing back and forth to the rhythm of bird calls,
or breathe in the scent of his mother's cooking