Its mossy green hair curls around as it grows.
It leans to the left and it curves to the right,
three steps to the porch where a welcoming light
blinks, beckons the lost who are roaming at night
with a spidery claw. If that’s you - don’t go in.
Getting back out is a fight you won’t win.
This house is so lonely it wants you to stay
there, and sleep in the sun, maybe twiddle your toes
or sit close to the stove when the cold winter snows
come. Just you, and the old house where no one else goes,
for everyone knows there’s a spell on that house,
on the table a cheese that will make you a mouse
if you eat it, a cat’s tail that whisks out of sight
round a corner. So, Stranger, beware and take flight.
Inside and outside the magic is stitched
in the stones, in the pitch of the roof, in the twitch
of the cat’s tail. This house is bewitched.
Lesley Moss © 2015
Katherine Lynas © 2015