Wooden Floor

Long pale panels, nailed together like criminals lined up for execution. Length-wise grain and fingerprint whorls and knots and dots of yet more nails. Scratched from wear and tear and the movement of furniture. Sometimes dark rosewood and glossy and sticky to the touch, sometimes pale beech and satin finished smooth on the fingertips. Where the planks aren't lined up perfectly are gaps that are minor speed bumps to my fingers running perpendicular along the surface. Smells of older woods that are dry and musty, covered in the future by potent lacquers that penetrate. Parquetry of smaller tiles all criss-crossed with random shades of wood, fit together in larger tiles that make for a floor that feels unbreakable under the heel of my boot, clonking throughout the house, creaking in spots I learn to remember and avoid. This wooden floor is raised metres above the ground and through a small hole in the wood come the earthy smells of hidden dirt, the wood cool to the touch for the river of breeze always flowing beneath.