These Are The Ways Of An Old House

the walls
are breathing
through each
rasping crack
a wheezing
contrary
eupnea

the air is
talking
with a
backwards chatter
an hermetic
arbiter laced
with menace

the boards
are walking
as invisible
footfalls
creak and
crawl to
warped demise

and I am
laying
dripping fear
as strangled
queer mewls
resound