rains run dark down door scrum
pink pallid finger finds button
dainty lite lit
and poised angled
pushes the hum
of the buzzer alive

within the steps come from
the darkness heavy
faster loud swifter
nearer
the lock shuttled opened
the lead panes
with greasy image
behind swerving
swings
open

a pale shivering teen
her ribbons limp and
damp from a dress

this aging fortress
tender of the gloom
in dark and grey

the livery color of their
meeting a clash of
service and folly

their eyes intruiguing
colonial empirical blue

"step in child and mind the carpet
I shall ring for Stanford to fetch a
change of warm clothes...So the
hounds and the wolves did not
sense U in this gale?"

the great blue eyes observed
she had made it past all of that
in this hour
perhaps the rumors were just
that.. she was a true heir
after all

...