The Weather in the Walls

The wall has been raining again.

Not water—
the darker kind,
that gathers behind paint
and waits for the room to sleep.

By morning, a weather-map
has opened above the skirting:
small fronts,
hairline thunder,
one pale country
where the plaster has given up.

I put my palm there.

The house keeps its temperature
like a person keeping a secret.
Warmth in the doorway.
Cold beside the window.
The old green stain
climbing towards the ceiling
with nowhere to be forgiven.

Outside, the rain makes a decision
of every roof it touches.

Inside, I listen:
the soft report of damp,
the timber answering,
the walls rehearsing
all the names they carried
before I moved in.

I used to call this inheritance.

Now I open the window.
Let the night enter cleanly.
Let the storm find its own body.

By morning, there is still a crack—
the wall admitting a little sky.