​The House, by Michal Perry

With Dad in His Kitchen, by Michal Perry (USA, b. Israel) 2021

​The House 
 
Stands in its solitude,
an abandoned wound.
 
I touch the scarred walls,
the small doors with peeling paint,
the bathtub full of cracks,
kitchen cabinets with their doors torn off,
a broken faucet in the sink.
 
Mom appears, materializes as a ghost
whose body coalesces from the
blood splatter on the walls.
A young woman in her thirties,
accompanied by her five daughters.
 
She touches everything –
The scattered objects, the pictures hanging on the walls,
the books arranged in the library covered with dust,
the grimy floor tiles.
 
She begins to scrub and scour the floor 
with her hardworking, reddened hands. 
 
Her voice is slender yet domineering,
she fervently explains how much she loves simplicity,
and chooses the colour of the kitchen ceramic tiles
– light green.
 
Noises, Jarring arguments escape through 
the closed door of the parents’ room.
 
I hear the echoes that seeped at nights 
into the sleeping walls, the ticking of 
mom’s typewriter keys, tap, tap.
 
Mom sits beside the black elliptical table in the kitchen,
immersed in a cloud of smoke, lighting cigarette after cigarette.
Her eyes fixed, capturing the page 
peeping out from the typewriter.
Letters piling upon letters, 
lines upon lines, neatly arranged.
 
For years, the house is empty of its dwellers.
For years, the walls drip blood.
 
For years, Dad clings to memories ensnaring 
their prey like spider webs.
 
For years, Dad recedes with the walls.
For years, Dad recedes with the voices.
 
I sit next to him, beside the
black elliptical table in the kitchen.
The pencils are arranged on the table.

Dad draws his self-portrait
as he looks at an old photograph of his.

His back hunched, his hand shriveled, trembling,
holding the pencil.
 
Dad is silent.
 
And I gaze at the green ceramic tiles.
Tile after tile, 
scratched with small black cracks.
 
Before time slips away.
 
Before the house turns
into a sole memory of

nothingness.

Michal Perry

Michal Perry is a poet, painter, and multidisciplinary artist. She was born in Jerusalem and graduated from the Avni Art Institute in Tel Aviv.  She completed her master's studies at Bar-Ilan University in comparative literature. Her poems have appeared in leading journals and she has published three full-length poetry collections in Israel. Between 1990-2004, Michal Perry lived and worked in New York City as manager and curator of the Klarfeld Perry Gallery. In addition, she presented solo exhibitions and participated in international group exhibitions in the US and Europe. Michal lives and works in New York City and Tel Aviv. www.michalperry.com