Suburban Sin

Pain spreading like mold
It roots into our walls
Feeding on the damp hate that soaks us
We breathe it in, poisoning this house
Anger looming, filling each room
It is cramped in this unforgiving home 

Yelling fills each morning, waking the world with rage
Old and young pitted against each other 
In a reprise of events of a decade and a half ago
A son who can’t see beyond the reflection of his own father in him
The same song playing on repeat with a new singer 

Mother scrub-scrub-scrubbing 
She’ll never lift this stain, it goes deeper than the cherry-wood floors
Father in the opposite room
Ignoring the sounds outside his door, this monster won’t go away if you pretend it doesn’t exist
Daughter hiding behind locked doors
But the wood and metal won’t keep out what lives inside this house 

Ghosts crawl out of the floor
The past resurrected 
It twists and distorts like a funhouse mirror
Showing how blame fits on everyone else
Never yourself, never yourself 

God on Sunday, a ritual that has long since lost all meaning
Sitting in pews we sing songs of forgiveness 
Kneeling before an altar, we pray for release, we pray for redemption
Each whispered prayer passes through folded hands goes into heaven unanswered
We are too far gone into our suburban sin
Unable to see past the trees of sprouting bias in our eyes
We pass the doors and forget God  

Like dancers in a music box, we wind ourselves up and spin out the same tune
On and on, we repeat the same arguments
The door slams in time with the last note
It will play out the same tomorrow night
There is only each new dawn of the same grueling day
And the taste of our own bitter resentment towards each other tainting our breakfast
There is no freedom from this hell.