The knife in the dark

Soft. I hear the toes spread, carpet fibres fill the spaces.

Weight gently shifted, one step as even as the next.

The air ripples along to where I am. The scent of blood, or is it merely iron?

My legs want to bolt, give away my position. I cannot let them.

Else the sharp will find the soft, and not even the dark can stop it.

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A chat with the ground

I was with the skull all evening,

smirking at its cold jokes.

Our breath came out in backwards hymns

as it spoke of what death is really like.

I said to it that I wanted to shake its hand

for giving me such relief.

It replied that

one day, when it worked up the energy,

it would reach its arms out of the earth

in daisies and let me pick them.

Thoughts from a shipwreck

Ocean life ignores the iron

desperately holding onto its skeleton, only knowing

another part of bed where prey can hide and predators seek.

Motes of debris sink to the port hole, or where it used to be

before rot came and the coral took root.

The ghosts don’t mind, the deep is quiet

and the pressure a comfort. Here they can rest

far better than their kin in the ground,

away from the irritating buzz of fear.

Those lost fauna

I can step into the shadows of their skin and feel

the warmth bound through me,

the earthy closeness of those burrowed days

nostalgic and pure.

The rains come and nourish the ground,

and when the skies clear to leave me

alone on the grass,

I whisper their names to keep them alive

for another year.

Spirit Walker

The silent children nod their heads as it approaches,

jumping from the thin branches to hitch a ride on its reaching antlers.

Green spreads from each step it takes, vines spiralling

into unicorn horn points to warn off man

if he should venture too close to the gateway.

It kisses the flowers in the mushroom ring

when the moon spills down, greets the waiting oak,

and passes through with its precious cargo safe and free.

Ghost act

The rain has filled up the circus tent, lithe

figures walking out of the wet floor to take their positions in the ring.

Spotlights create mirrors as they climb up thin vines

to the trapeze at the top. Aerial acrobatics

for anyone wanting to watch, energy matching

the stink of old straw, popcorn and tinsel pompoms left behind.

Outside, the sun breaks through and sends evening’s fire

around the grounds, sneaking into the big top as the act begins.

The performer jumps and evaporates, nothing more than steam.

Testing. Testing.

It may be nothing.

A whisper.

A shadow.

A breeze.

 

It may be a nameless,

shapeless mass

that is only the ghost of a ghost,

an unwelcome spectre, but a harmless one.

 

It may be. It may be.

Plucking electric wire

Eyes flick side to side, ticking their way through the hours.

Cheeks aglow

facing another way,

taste buds tasting buds sickeningly sweet.

Toughening the scales: use them to shield a heart.

 

Following up the path, a memory’s ghost.

A waste bin of paper, each sheet

etched with all that you are

and a hundred ‘might have been’s’.

Simulacrum

I cry rainbows at night when I think no-one else is near. Flower skeletons decay even more in my mind and silhouettes of birds turn out to be no more than shaped words. Carefully chosen, trimmed to perfection like a prize bonsai tree. My wings have been clipped. I’ve been pressed against pages leaving only an imprint behind. I am not myself. I am the person someone else wants to see.

Step to it

Beneath our feet in the coils of carpet

full of dander, paper fibres and pollen,

past the underlay thick as a pinky finger,

the floorboards warped to become musical notes

when stepped on, down

into the foundations

is a pulse. A beat.

A rhythmic tap of a dancer’s shoes,

the drum of fingers on a worktop,

a family getting into a car and shutting the doors

one after another.

When the house is empty,

the beat stops.

A light in the unoccupied spare bedroom switches on.

Click.