Haunted house

The house accommodates the man, holds his life. And, in the empty rooms, memories, like dust, lie all around. There is time to be happy, the house knows. The house was once happy. Potted plants shone greenly in the slant of the afternoon sun. There was laughter and the echo of laughter and then silence.

I am here. Standing here, standing still. Haunted by this man, by his routines. Like clockwork, he rises, puts on the coffee, waits until steam rises from the spout of the pot and fills the cold air with its warm aroma. And even now, even in the depths of this long winter I think back to those warmer days, to those green leaves, to that abundance, when the dense air trembled with laughter.