Secret rooms, hidden behind walls,
books, red cushions and a chair,
visited in dreams, well known.

Narrowed passageways and stairs
climb above the twisted chimney stacks.
They rise like curling smoke, a spiral.

Doors that open inward lead out to
the dove cote, fountain, walls of mossy stone,
pathways, apple trees and pears.

At last I leave this house.
Beyond the gate
the island, slate and jagged rocks,

a swaying broken bridge in sighing wind,
a fragile home of glass and salted timber.
High tides beat against it, retreating in a spray.

A window cracks. I am not afraid.
The lighthouse calls out through the fog,
receding echoes that return again,

a sound that swings around the bay.
In dreams, when I am swept away,
the waiting house remains.