We spent the day clinging on
To those walls and bricks and mortar we called home
We made it ours
We left our mark in smiles
And the hallways rang with laughter.
We wet the walls with tears and hugged the stones goodbye
Ran our hands along the doorframes
And felt the warmth of pipes beneath the kitchen floor
We ran up and down the stairs
Till our ears knew who was who
And looked up and said a prayer to the spider in the corner
And asked please, would he look after the house when we were gone?
We smiled out onto the garden that we never got to use
And savoured dreams of barbeques and study parties on the grass
And the bowl of water we left out for birds in Michaelmas
We thanked the front door for its sturdiness and the safety it provided
And the slam of it at midnight when the bars are closed and we all
came
home
And all the locks we never used.
We filled that house with promises and happy ghosts.
And we came together and we got drunk,
Oh, we got so gloriously drunk,
Our little nook set low into the concrete street
Hummed with life one final time
And we remembered all the people we let in the kitchen window
All those bodies half-in half-out
The fairy lights we wound around the gate at Christmas
And the painting on the fridge door –
All the inside jokes these walls contain
All the home cooked meals that kitchen gave us
And the warm golden glow of home against the rain –
We thanked the house and said goodbye
But those happy ghosts remained.
Photo: Simon Sikorski (2018)
Poet Bio
Home?
My own space, where I can be alone and feel safe.
What is home to you?
My student house in Cambridge.
Maddi Jackson is an English finalist at the University of Cambridge. She has been writing poetry for several years and has been featured in a small number of magazines and books. Outside of writing, she is also passionate about rowing and is kept busy by her role as Vice-Captain of her boat club. Her biggest ambition for this year is to earn ‘blades’ at the end of the year in the biggest rowing race in Cambridge.