The weekend house

I look at my father, and I tell him I can't come to visit
but I don't mention the fact that I feel strange in a place that's no longer my home
my weekend house with all of us together in pictures on the wall, reminding me of my old life

He asks me what I want to do with my life, and I wonder how can I answer this stranger, this father?
it seems that we have each built our own protective wall, and now they're too high to climb over...even for a visit
he asks me when I'm coming home in a voice that sounds unfamiliar and strange

I don't answer, and that silence seems strange
and then I mumble something about how there's a lot going on in my life, otherwise...I would come home
and then he nods his head just like a father
I wonder if he knows why I won't visit as he stares blankly behind me at the crumbling wall

I think of all the empty spaces between each wall of my weekend house, and how it shouldn't be strange to him because he was never there
so now why should I visit?
it wouldn't make any difference in his life, and now he wants to be my father?
he wants my weekend house to seem like a home?

When we were a family in that home there was no wall between me and my father
it was only after I left that his voice became strange
but I pretended that everything was all the same in my life when I came to visit
and now I hardly ever visit because I don't want to come home and realize how much I miss our old life
seeing those pictures of the past hanging on the wall, her smile so painfully strange
because that daughter looks so happy sitting on the shoulders of her father

My father says it's a strange thing that I don't want to come back home to visit and talk about life to a wall.