Aley Grand Hotel, Lebanon — Check Out
by Dawg
The Aley Grand lingers above the town, a crumbling mirage,
its balconies draped in ivy, facades cracked by decades of sabotage.
Columns still striving for grace beneath layers of dust and regret,
each window a blackened eye socket, watching the world forget.
The shimmer that once lit these rooms with laughter and deals whispered low–
now faded armchairs huddle, threadbare, under chandeliers that glow
with a jaundiced light, flickering over corridors warped by time,
where carpets trap the last warmth of footsteps that crossed the grime.
Past midnight, the ballroom lives in a dance only shadows recall,
phantom women glide, beaded gowns sweeping the length of the hall,
their partners etched by memory alone–gloved hands clutching air–
every swirl and pirouette a plea for someone, anyone, to care.
In the lobby, porters once grinned beneath gold-braided caps,
now they fade in the periphery, chasing eternity’s gaps.
Their faces half-formed, not quite gone, not quite seen,
their laughter haunting the settees, the space in between.
Somewhere, a bell rings–soft, insistent, echoing far too late–
a call for service unanswered, a knock that will never abate.
And in the grand bar, bottles dusted and label-less line the shelves,
poured by hands you’ll never see, for guests who only exist as themselves.
The walls hum with secrets, voices seep from their cracks,
a mother’s lullaby, a child’s giggle, a traitor’s deathbed pacts.
They stain the wallpaper, inhabit every thread,
ghosts as real as the mold on the drapes, the perfume of the dead.
At the spiral staircase, where the banister gleams faint gold,
every step is a ledger of stories, of memories never told.
Outside, Aley rushes by, oblivious and bright,
but within the Grand, each minute is nailed to perpetual night–
check in and out are illusions, time loops in this haunted frame,
a purgatory spun of longing, of guilt, of glamour, of shame.
The Aley Grand endures, a mausoleum dressed as a dream–
a theater for the restless, for every unfinished scheme.
Those who dare wander its chambers after the world’s last shout
are fated to join its company–no one ever truly checks out.