The Security Guard Who Sets Fires in Hotel Rooms

There once was a security guard

Who set fires

In hotel rooms

He would walk the halls

And if a door was open

And a room was unoccupied

He would casually stroll in

Light a match

And set it on the bed

Sometimes it would burn out

And sometimes it would catch

And if it caught he would leave the room

And wait for the sprinkler system

To go off

Then report it over the walkie

Room after room

Lit up and evacuations were conducted

Investigations commenced

But the security guard

Was the first line of defense

And so it was a long time

Before we figured out

Who the culprit was

When we caught him in the act

He still had the match in his hand

The smallest flame you’ve ever seen

At the very tip of it

And he looked at us

Right before he dropped it

On the surface of the bed

We were so preoccupied

With putting out the fire--

A fast one that time

That ignited almost immediately

Upon touching the duvet

By the time

We’d tamped it out

The security guard

Was nowhere

To be found

Now when we walk the halls

We smell smoke

And can’t find the source

We get complaints

That the heat in the room

Is turned up to high

In rooms where the heat

Hasn’t worked in years

We can’t open

Certain doors

And some windows

Fog up and cannot be cleared

No matter how hard we wipe them down

Nobody can find

The security guard

And when we went to the address

He gave us

On his application

It was a laundromat

That hadn’t been open for years

And yet

We’re not worried

About him coming back

But we somehow

Feel haunted

Is it possible

To be haunted

By someone

Who isn’t dead?

We managed to keep the story

Of the arsonist security guard

Out of the news

But somehow the guests know

Something is wrong

Or was wrong

And somehow continues

To keep being wrong

The hallways are smaller now

And we can’t figure out why

There are less rooms

We go to book a room

And it’s not there anymore

We check for a door

And the door is gone

But the room is still there

And there’s a guest in it

And we can’t get to them

But they’re not screaming

But they should be

But we don’t know what to do

Because if somebody

Doesn’t want to help

It’s impolite 

To give it to them anyway

The building had twelve floors

Now it has eleven

But yesterday it had thirteen

And we didn’t like thirteen

But we can live with eleven

The security guard

Was always on patrol

Up on the twelfth floor

So when we have eleven

We really feel like he’s gone

Even though every night

A fire starts

In a different room

Of course now we don’t know

Who could be lighting

All these fires

It’s got to be someone

But we keep hoping

That one day

Our problems will change

Just like

Everything else