Storied

The house on the lake, awake, asleep,

Has legends to tell, and secrets, keep,

Of seasons fled and of lives gone by,

In whispers, hushed, like the distant cry

Of an owl that’s flown on her muffled wing—

The house on the lake holds everything

Behind closed shutters and boarded doors,

As tightly as novels protect their stores

Of stories—the ghosts of bygone make

The pages turn in the house on the lake.