Girls Running From Houses

The girl, like the first wife, sings to herself.

Like one of the girls before her, she is beloved of death.

Lost things. The truth, laid out in the gardens. A massive scroll.

She arrives at the house at sundown, seeking information. She is herself a haunted building.

Faithful reader, even as you comfort yourself that reason must prevail, you find in a curiousity shop a photograph of a ruined mansion.

The house, like the girl, is dove-sturdy.

On the longest night of the year, the girl is fleeing the house.

The walls of the house are honeycombed by forgotten chambers.

The house shoulders against the wind. The kitchen was somewhere else before this. In the dining room, the groundskeeper keeps a record.

The fate of the house turns on the competition between the girl and the footman.

Brown rats haunt the groundskeeper.

She is sky-tongued, and that will save her.

The fate of the girl turns on the rivalry between the housekeeper and the lawyer.

At midnight, she imagines she hears weeping.

The house (which blurs at the edge of sight) is constructed following the patterns of a labyrinth.

She discovers that the house breaks out in miniatures. But in addition, there is a history of sightings of a spectral nun, who foretells the fall of the house and who overturns potted plants.

The heir is mysterious. The footman is invoked.

The girl is racing from the house in autumn.

The house is alleged to have stood at the site of a battle.

From time to time when she is almost happy, she is aware of something skittering out of sight.

The spy. The housekeeper. The neighbour. They promise her too much.

She is the girl's secret supporter.

In the moment the girl flees the house, everything will change.

It's all happening as it ever has, as dictated by the stones beneath the house. One girl escapes the house; another arrives before dawn, seeking directions.

She discovers that the house is afflicted with nettles. But in addition, there is a rumour of a hairy rider, who recites forgotten poetry and who crumbles little bits of plaster from the mouldings.

She flees, pursued by the stars.

The girl, like the house, hums a little tune.

The house (which looms above the landscape) is built around a lost village.

The house wants to know whether the girl is sensitive to its needs.

Refracted through the absent panes of the ancient windows in the abandoned wing, the girl dreams she sees everything, all of it.