This is a poem that I wrote about the old house that I live in.
We don’t know its exact age, but it was probably built around the late 18th century. We have a census record showing it full to the brim with a family and their servant in 1821. Some of the original features have survived, others have been renovated-out to suit modern tastes.
I have often imagined the past residents of this house – seeing in my minds eye the paraphernalia of those past lives, that must have one filled the space… How did those lives differ from my own? And how does the thread of human existence link us all too?
Time Tethers
by Nicki MacRae, 2024.
How many storms
have these walls weathered,
whilst lashing winds
strain lithic tethers?
Nature’s whims in
supernal battle,
cause locks and casements
to strain and rattle,
and moon and branch
cast ghostly figures,
and gusts in waves
make draperies shiver.
Did powder fall
from pomaded hair
when centuries-past storms
stirred this same air?
Would porcelain quake
And candles stutter,
as cascading rain
filled cast iron gutters?
Timbers woven by
man’s insistence,
brace slates and panes
in stout resistance.
My silent thanks
for this aged erection –
two hundred years of
stayed protection.
If you’d like to hear the poem with narration, please click the video link below.
The images in the video are from my house itself.