The Recluse in No.8

I’m the recluse in No.8
the bearded creep with the little dog
the sounds of wailing and rage
filtering down to you who live below
I shamble out to the brambles
watch my dog do her business
and you wonder what mine is

I see the way you look at me
the recluse in No.8
with suspicion and dark
curiosity
am I a child molester?
do I deal drugs?
why do I never leave?

Wasn’t there a girl in there
a wife or lover
of the recluse from no.8?
where did she go, when did she leave?
if I was her, married to that guy
I’d have left long ago
who’d want to live with him?

You don’t see my tears
you don’t staunch the bleeding
of my broken heart
me, the recluse from No.8,
I’ve forgotten how to be happy
and it isn’t even always my fault
and these four walls keep me in

Without the crumbling white plaster
and battered, rotten wood
my guts and brains would have oozed away
in the strong midwest wind that shakes
the walls and rattles the windows
out of which the recluse from no.8
watches the outside world

I used to stand on my balcony
watch the birds fly by
and the squirrels scamper about
I used to count the bunnies and the minutes
wait for my girl to come back home
I wasn’t always a broken man
I wasn’t always a recluse in No.8