Grandmother's House

He hated his grandmother's house
with its heavy curtains
bleakly disapproving
of the postman's tardy shoes,
and how the maid
rescued the newspaper
and poured the thin sherry
into tiny glasses
every night at six.
He loathed the claw foot sofas
with their cushions
shrinking from his trousers,
each plush thread recoiling
like conversation,
reminding him
how unkempt he looked
and why his brother left.

He despised the birchwood beds
carved into sarcophagi
that flanked the radiators,
their pencil posts
poking the bodies of the willing
and how the bookcases groaned knowingly,
waiting for ominous words
to echo from the hallway
and beat down the keyholes.
But most of all
he hated the dining table
with its sallow wood
gleaming his reflection,
the china left
to fend for itself
and the cutlery
swallowing up the family
like a feast lost at noon.