Public Republic

Donal Mahoney

Photo: Crunchy Footsteps

Sue phones the hotel around midnight.
Two weeks earlier, at her request,
I took a room there.
Three bags,

half packed in the corner,
are ready to go back.
“There’s been a fire,”
Sue says. I ask

“Is everyone all right?”
They are. “How did it start?”
“My matches,” Sue says,
“and one of the kids.”

Weeks later, I visit the kids
at the house and find
the workmen have finished.
From the top stair, Meg shouts,

“Dad, come up and see my new walls!”
Dad can’t come up there, I tell her.
“All right,” Meg says, “I’ll bring
my new walls down to you.”