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The Hole in the Bathroom Wall

The cottage was old, it needed some work
The walls were of crumbling stone,
The windows, like eyes in a tumbledown Kirk
Were staring, like sockets of bone;
I hadn't much money, I hadn't much choice,
'I'll take it, ' I said to the man,
If only I'd known what the future would bring
I would never have shaken his hand.

My marriage had failed, I had my young son
Just three and a half in the spring,
We bought an old bed and a table, two chairs,
Drove up there and went to move in;
The floorboards were creaky, the walls were damp,
The place was as filthy as hell,
I sat the young lad on the floor by a lamp
And I cleaned, until darkness fell.

The rooms were all empty, they echoed and stirred,
I thought I heard whispers and moans,
The ghosts of the past tried to warn me, I guess,
I couldn't interpret their groans;
I tucked up the lad after dinner, in bed,
And I wandered the house overall,
Then checked out the water, and turning my head
Saw a hole in the bathroom wall.

It wasn't that big, but was over the bath,
I could see through the damp and the rot,
It wouldn't take that much to fill it, I thought,
Then I took a long walk, and forgot;
For days I was painting, cementing and fixing
The cracks were all over the place,
But never a thought of that hole in the wall -
To my ultimate shame, and disgrace.

Outside the cottage, a paddock ran back,
All burnt up and brown in the sun,
There wasn't a leaf or a stick that was green
The summer had barely begun;
Old pieces of iron lay thick on the ground
And lizards lay under their shade,
I should have been warned, but it just didn’t dawn
On me then, to my utter dismay.

A month had gone by, the weather was dry,
So hot that we suffered like hell,
I drew a warm bath, only tepid and low
So the lad could cool off for a spell,
I reached for a towel, but nothing was there,
I remembered it out on the line,
Then ran out the back to retrieve it, and saw
What has ever since haunted my mind.

For over behind the old cottage, there slid
A brown skinned, and hideous snake,
Six foot in length it ignored me and went
For the hole where the wall was baked,
Slowly its body slid into the hole
As I stood there just shaking in fear,
My beautiful baby was sat in the bath
As his deadly opponent drew near.

I ran through the door and I screamed as I ran,
I made for the bathroom door,
Everything seemed to go suddenly slow
As I slid on the muddy, wet floor,
I finally got to the bathroom door,
Reached out, as I started to fall,
The snake had reared up, preparing to strike
From the hole in the bathroom wall.

We often remember 'the day of the snake'
Since my son has grown taller than me,
He has this aversion to lizards and snakes,
And goanna's and skinks in the tree,
We regularly walk round the cottage and fix
Any cracks, any holes, overall;
I lost my right arm from the snake as it struck
From the hole in the bathroom wall.

12 March 2008

poem by David Lewis Paget
Added by Poetry Lover
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