EMPTY HOUSE
H. W. Bryce
—after watching Marcia burr’s vid Mack the Knife and
Another One Bites the dust
–Also a line from my poem with the line One unnoticed moment…
Quick, she’s looking the other way:
He creeps in through the back door…
One Unnoticed Moment
Is all that it took,
And the Silent Thief began his burglary.
First, he took some little things,
Things that wouldn’t be missed,
Then larger things, things that
Would remain a mystery. Then
More of same, and she would
Blame herself. Maybe she forgot…
Stock in trade for Silent Thief,
Gas Light her, confuse her,
Make her ashamed and frightened
Of reporting things gone missing
Lest some kind of blame is laid
On her. Ha! Got away with that.
Time to up the stakes.
Take your time, Silent Thief tells
Himself. Play it cool. You’ve got
Her attention now. She’s not
Thinking straight. She won’t even
Tell her husband, and he doesn’t
Noticed the difference. He is
Living in that Unnoticed Moment.
Silent Thief lays low for a while.
He lets things percolate. She
Thinks, “Maybe I will be all right.”
Little does show know this
Silent Thief. His greater goal
Awaits. His plans are laid.
But then, her keys are gone,
Her address unknown, she
Has mislaid her recipes
The Silent Thief has got them all,
Stashed away in his Secret Drawer.
It has become personal now
So addled is poor Housewife
She doesn’t even recognize
Her husband; thinks he is
And Intruder, attacks him
With a frying pan. She can’t
Stand all of this thievery. It is
Driving her crazy. She has truly
Been Gas Lit. She is completely
Lost in her almost empty house.
Another Unnoticed Moment.
She has forgotten how to get back home.
Time to strike. This time it is
The Kitchen Sink Theft. It is
Monu-mental. And she is
Devastated. This time, Husband
Does take notice. She is in
Deep trouble, and he does not
Know what to do. They scream HELP!
Now she dwells inside her empty house,
Where nothing is stirring, not even a mouse,
And rattling around lost is her lonely spouse,
Whose grief of her loss perpetually dwells.
And the bailiffs, they come to take her away.
But they let her poor husband alone to stay.
He falls to his knees, he learns how to pray
His life now is clouded, reduced to a caitiff.*
And Silent Thief moves on, so many rich houses
To pilfer, so many unnoticed moments, he espouses,
For his treasury: shack or mansion or boathouse.
He gives himself authority, the privilege of The Thief.
Thus the lady in the house empty is laid low.
The Thief takes his bow, he takes it very low.
* Caitiff is pretty rare in contemporary use, but it has functioned since the 14th century as an adjective and also as a noun meaning “a base, cowardly, or despicable person” (as in Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure: “O thou caitiff!
