Echoes (Stained)

Squirm in murky lairs of hate --
gasping, suffocation, intoxication --
as the screams and bangs,
moans and whispers from beyond your walls
break through you, almost rhythmic,
but somehow too loud to take.
And she dances, dizzy,
as she wanders long corridors and longer halls,
not knowing where her feet took her but still following,
till she reached a corner and gagged.
As eyes shy away from it --
Rotting, decaying, chest heaving --
something that made for a female body.
And as I moved closer, I smiled,
just happy it wasn't a mirror reflection.
Selfish. She glares, rotting further,
her head tilting upward, questioning
if what she's faced wasn't enough.

Quiet, I only turn to follow
the red that escapes her feet,
to another room where
the echoes of his screams and anger
are more than what whispering walls can hold within.
While in another sits a muttering child,
breaking glass and lashing knives,
not knowing what they're for,
not knowing what he's for.
Her son, her son who knew not where he is.
And in part fear, part indifference
I scrambled back to where I was,
past the rocking chair that was never sat in,
yet rocked with the storm that brew inside.
I scrambled back, looking for light grilled wall to wall
that windows didn't let in.

And as fingers crawled, prodding, almost digging
trying to make the tiniest hole that would let me escape,
I found you, singing in the brightest shade of moonlight.
Your songs muffling the screams,
almost healing the wounds.
Almost... If only I could touch you,
if only I could sleep in your arms and forget
the colors that stained the world.
Forget the dark puddles they swam in,
laced with oil, brushing only the surface,
but the surface is all thats ever seen; ugly.
And as I sob for the very first time,
I wished the walls that made this feeble home
would crumble...