The sun had set on the mountain top
Before we could get away,
I hadn’t wanted to drive by night
But rather the light of day,
The sky was filled with a ghostly glow
The last few rays of the sun,
When I drove out to the open road,
Our journey had just begun.

I’d promised that I would get her there
I wasn’t going to renege,
She must have asked me a dozen times,
Was even beginning to beg,
I said, ‘They’re going to be waiting there
No matter how late we are,
They won’t be starting without you, girl,
For you are the principle star.’

That calmed her down, she was mollified,
Though she’d been upset for days,
She worried that she’d be there too late,
She’d said, in a blank dismay,
She thought it was such an honour to
Be picked as the chosen one,
‘I’ve never been picked for anything,
Before,’ was the song she sung.

We nosed down into the valley as
The darkness turned to grim,
With only the beam of the headlights
Like a tunnel we were in,
‘It seems to be taking a lifetime,’
Was the only thing she said,
‘I know, but the end of a lifetime is
The time that you are dead.’

She’d paid especial attention to
The dress she had to wear,
Had glossed her lips and had rouged her cheeks
And had tidied up her hair,
I paid her the best of compliments
That I knew she wanted to hear,
And told her that I was proud of her,
On this special night of the year.

We finally came to a grove of trees
And we turned our headlights in,
Throwing fantastic shadows as our
Wheels began to spin,
We stopped just under a giant oak
And I said, ‘We’re here at last.
You’re certain you want to go through with it?’
She said, ‘It will be a blast!’

Then shapes came out of the grove of trees
Wearing hoods and capes of black,
They gathered around the car, and stood
And stared, on that forest track,
When Emily went to join them they
Stood back to let her pass,
And led her into a clearing where
She lay down, on the grass.

It was then they began their chanting
Like a choir in a church,
Rising and falling, lilting, it was fine
And yet a dirge,
For then a man danced into the ring
Who wore the head of a goat,
From under his cape he drew a knife,
Leant down, and cut her throat.

David Lewis Paget

‘You have to come up to the house,’ she said,
‘I hate to be there at night,
I have two ghosts in the old bedposts
And each of them wants to fight,
They make their way to the kitchen there
And clatter the pots and pans,
The woman ghost is a Gretel, and
The masculine ghost is Hans.’

I said, ‘You must be imagining,
There’s not a ghost you can see,’
‘Well, I’ve got two and I’m telling you
I see, believe you me!
The guy is a cranky, violent fool,
He must have been bad in life,
While she defends herself with a stool
Each time that he beats his wife.’

The house was Gothic and Romanesque
And leaned out over the street,
It had an arch like a gothic church
With an overhead retreat.
And that’s where she kept the poster bed
Where the ghosts, she said, reside,
‘They can’t come out in the light of day
So they go in there to hide.’

We spent the evening playing cards
To wait for the witching hour,
Sat in our coats to await the ghosts
And their ectoplasmic shower,
‘It often gets messy,’ Cassandra said,
‘At the point they first appear,
They give out this vapour in the air,
A bit like the froth on beer.’

It must have been eleven o’clock
When Cassandra fell asleep,
I thought I could see her nodding off
Though her eyes began to peep,
Each nostril gave out a pale white smoke
And it formed on left and right,
One was Gretel and one was Hans
And it gave me quite a fright.

It didn’t take them a moment then,
She screamed and he would bawl,
He beat her with a broom handle and
Then pinned her against the wall,
She kicked him fair in the shins and ran
Right out of the room in there,
I watched him yell as he followed her
Down by the kitchen stair.

And then there was a clatter of pans
A noise like you’ve never heard,
They threw them around the kitchen
Until Gretel was calling ‘Merde!’
I tried to rouse Cassandra, who
Was groggy, but still awake,
I said, ‘You’ll have to be exorcised,’
And watched her begin to shake.

‘They may have been in the bedposts when
You came, I’m sure that’s true,
But maybe they found a better place
For now they live in you.’
I told her the ectoplasm formed
From her, and from whence it came,
She covered her mouth and nose and said,
‘They’ll never get back again!’

When daylight dawned in that gothic house
And the sun came shining in,
The ghosts came back to the bedroom and
They paid for their ghostly sin,
Cassandra fended them off until
They both were shouting, ‘Merde!’
Until the light had destroyed them with
A scream that you should have heard.

There’s not been a ghost in that gothic house
From then until this day,
I’m visiting still with Cassandra and
We’ve found a game to play,
It has to do with that poster bed
With its polished, wooden posts,
But the one thing that we’re certain of,
We’ll never be seen by ghosts.

David Lewis Paget

He told me that once he’d killed someone,
A long, long time in the past,
He’d held him down and he’d used a gun,
I said I was just aghast.
He said it merely to threaten me,
I don’t know if it was true,
He said if I kept on seeing her,
‘In future, that could be you!’

He shocked me so that my hands had shook,
I reached and grabbed at his coat,
I said, ‘Don’t ever dare threaten me
Or you’ll feel my hands at your throat!’
His face went white and he backed away
He wasn’t the bravest one,
But turned to say as he walked away,
‘Next time, I’ll carry a gun.’

I asked Joanne if she even knew
Just what he was really like,
She laughed, and said it was said in fun,
‘Just tell him to take a hike.’
She’d once gone out on a party date
With him, but only the once,
He seemed to think they were drawn by fate,
‘But really, he’s such a dunce.’

‘Do you think that we should tell the police,
You know, it might have been true,
How would you feel if someone died
And all on account of you?’
‘Believe me, he wouldn’t have the guts,
He’s just a weasel at heart,
Put him next to a skunk, you’ll see,
You couldn’t tell them apart.’

Joanne and I went our different ways,
It hadn’t been working out,
I found her nice but her heart was ice,
That’s not what it’s all about.
She passed me by with a man called Guy
And I wished them well to begin,
She said that Ted had gone off his head,
Had started his threatening.

It must have been only a month or more
That I heard how Guy was done,
His body lay in the city morgue
After a hit and run.
Joanne was almost beside herself
In fear, and took to her bed,
‘It’s true, I should have listened to you,
It must have been Ted,’ she said.

The Spring had faded to Summer when
I ran into her again,
Clung to the arm of the hated Ted,
I couldn’t believe it then.
But the fear was there in her startled eyes
It was all too plain to see,
He looked at me with a faint surprise
And he said, ‘Now look at me!’

I wasn’t surprised when the news came down
Along with the winter flood,
A woman ran from a house in town
Upset, and covered in blood,
A man lay stabbed in the bed in there
It seems that she’d cut his throat,
She said it was more than a saint could bear
In a hasty, scribbled note.

I don’t know what will happen to her
They say it’s up to the court,
But I’ll be there as a witness for
Joanne, and the justice sought.
She’d known it wasn’t an idle threat
When she saw what happened to Guy,
And said that he had her terrified
When he mouthed the word, ‘Goodbye!’

David Lewis Paget

There lives a poet beyond the trees
But all that he writes is pain,
He spends his evenings down on his knees
Regretting the way he came,
He thinks of the path he should have trod
And the path that he really took,
Then writes regrets in a verse to God
And places them all in a book.

A single book on an altar there
That nobody else will see,
He won’t let anyone read his verse
For, ‘That’s between God, and me!’
But he reads and writes them over again
And his tears will stain his cheek,
‘They’re only the faults of mortal men,’
He thinks, but they make him weep.

He weeps for the loss of an innocence
That he barely remembers now,
It seems so long since his world went wrong
Yet he cannot imagine how.
He tried so hard to be godly then
But the good in his deeds went sour,
And hurt so many he knew back when,
He lies in his bed, to cower.

His heart had leapt on the wings of love
It brought him a purer truth,
He thought she came from the lord above
But all that she had was youth,
And time and fortune had withered that
As the tone in her voice went harsh,
It went from roses and sweet perfume
To the croak you hear in the marsh.

Would nothing pleasant inspire his verse,
Would nothing brighten his day?
He’d sit and chew on his feather quill
And search for something to say.
There must be more to a life than this
For others were doing well,
While he would brood on the sadder bits,
Imagining life as hell.

A girl went wandering though the trees
Carolling loud and clear,
It brought the poet up from his knees
And straining so he could hear,
She sang the song of a trilling bird
And the poet’s eyes were bright,
His heart leapt higher the more he heard
And he took her home that night.

His verses now hold the sweet refrain
Of a birdsong, light and free,
He wields his quill with an inner thrill,
‘How could this happen to me?’
The book of pain on the altar’s stained
With neglect, and barely a nod,
‘I’ll take this life with my darling wife
And I’ll leave the rest to God!’

David Lewis Paget

There isn’t much left of The Grange today,
There isn’t much left at all,
Only a charred left wing, I think,
And the odd, still standing wall,
The central Hall is a pile of ash
As it was, the day I left,
Sat on the back of the doc’s grey mare
As the Lady Mary wept.

It wasn’t supposed to end like this
On the day of the wedding ball,
Balloons and streamers hung from the roof
As the marriage carriage called,
Annette stepped out like a fairy queen
In her ****** white, and lace,
While Reece, the Groom, in the wedding room
Had a smile on his handsome face.

And I led the Lady Mary in
To the mother’s pride of place,
I only had eyes for her that day
As she walked with a widow’s grace,
It wasn’t a secret, I yearned for her
But this was her daughter’s day,
So I was content with the hand she lent
For she squeezed, along the way.

The priest stood up by a lectern as
The guests all prayed and knelt,
To bless their way on this wedding day
I’m sure it was truly felt,
But Mary’s brother-in-law was there
With an evil look in his eye,
He’d wanted to claim the Grange from her
Since the day her husband died.

‘The Grange belonged to my family,’
He’d say, ‘and I want it back,
You only married into the place
When you wed my brother, Jack.’
He made an offer, but she said no,
The Grange had become her home,
‘You sold your part to Jack at the start
Before you went off to roam.’

But Douglas, he had an evil mind
And his countenance was stern,
He said if he couldn’t have The Grange
Then he’d rather see it burn.
He’d brought three barrels of gunpowder
Unseen, but out in the yard,
He chose this day to make Mary pay,
We should have been on our guard.

The guests were all engaged at the front
When he wheeled the barrels in,
It takes a mind of evil intent
To imagine this kind of sin,
Annette had lifted her wedding veil
And raised her lips to the groom,
When all hell suddenly came to play
In the depths of that wedding room.

The hall was full of the screams and cries
Of those who lay on the floor,
While I picked the Lady Mary up
And carried her out to the door,
It was there we saw the bride, Annette
Who’d made it out to the porch,
The groom was dead, but the bride had fled
As her dress went up like a torch.

There isn’t much left of The Grange today,
There isn’t much left at all,
Only a charred left wing, I think,
And the odd, still standing wall.
But the Lady Mary married me
In the wake of all the strife,
Her daughter’s gone, but our love is strong,
And Douglas is serving life.

David Lewis Paget

I used to think that thunder was
The sound of the Hammer, Thor,
He’d beat it up on the clouds above
Each time he was waging war,
He’d quell his foes with a lightning strike
Or drown them all in his rain,
Whenever he came along at night
His purpose was always pain.

For we lived down in the valley where
The tendency was to flood,
Whenever the river was swollen with
A squirt of his enemy’s blood,
We’d have to climb up to higher ground
And sit there, soaked to the skin,
With lightning flashing around our heads
We’d need to pay for our sins.

‘Pay for our sins,’ my father said
In a voice that rumbled and roared,
He’d pull a hood up over his head
And speak to the god called Thor,
Then Thor replied with a mighty blast
To drown out my father’s cries,
As if he answered him there at last,
‘All that you speak are lies!’

While mother sat in a silent weep
As often she’d done before,
‘Why did you have to build our house
Way down on the valley floor?
We would have been safer, further up
And still walk down to the stream,
To carry a bucket of water up,
But all that you do is dream!’

That was his sin, my mother said,
He didn’t know black from white,
He never looked far enough ahead
He didn’t know wrong from right,
Dreaming up schemes that failed, it seems
Like a prophet, living in dread,
That one black night at the river’s height
We’d all be drowned in our bed.

‘Not that his bed means much to him,’
My mother would often moan,
‘Not since that gypsy girl, that Kym
Stayed in the valley alone,
He spends his time in her caravan
Drinking her gypsy tea,
And letting her hold and read his hand,
He never did that with me!’

And so it was on a cold, black night
He’d gone to her caravan,
‘Just to check that she’ll be all right,’
He said, just playing the man,
The thunder crashed on the mountain top
While we prayed, and gave up thanks,
To the mighty Thor beating at our door
That the river not break its banks.

Lightning flashed though the vale of trees
Where she’d parked her gypsy van,
And then my mother was on her knees
As we heard a mighty bang,
For lightning struck at the heart of sin
And it set the van ablaze,
While both the sinners were trapped within
And paid for their sinful ways.

We buried him on the valley floor
For my mother said, ‘It’s right.
He doesn’t deserve a headstone
Nor a grave that’s watertight.’
Whenever the god of thunder calls
And the river overflows,
I think of my father down below
And I wonder if he knows.

David Lewis Paget

The Lord High Constable’s men came down
To Camberwell’s village square,
They asked the Crier to call Oyez
To gather the villagers there,
He rang his bell and the people came
Agog, when they heard him say,
A rogue they sought was abroad, they thought,
Was last seen heading their way.

‘Beware this man, he’s an evil rogue,
He battered his wife to death,
The woman lay in a blind dismay
Breathing her final breath,
If anyone sees a stranger here
Who looks like a feral lout,
Be sure to alert the magistrates
By calling the footpad out.’

The people scattered, went to their homes
And locked and bolted each door,
Then stood there parting the curtains,
Just to be safe and sure,
Most of the men were still at work
But not for the widow Hayes,
She’d not long buried the husband
She’d loved in her salad days.

So when she turned the key in the lock
She couldn’t resist a tear,
She missed the man who would hold her hand
And quieten every fear,
She was much too young for a widow,
Or that’s what everyone said,
And so was Tom, but he’d travelled on,
Had left to lie with the dead.

She turned, was suddenly listening
When she heard an alien note,
And there stood a man in her kitchen
Holding a knife at her throat,
‘I mean no harm, don’t be alarmed
I just need a place to stay,
And please don’t weep, for I just need sleep,
But don’t give the game away.’

He made her lie on her narrow bed
And he cuddled up behind,
One of his arms around her waist
Though he asked if she didn’t mind,
She lay there, feeling his body warmth
And it made her think of Tom,
Would ever she feel like this again,
How long, Oh Lord, how long?

She didn’t know how it happened, but
She felt when he raised her shift,
Deep in the dark, dead pit of night
Her skirt had begun to lift,
She bit her knuckle and shed the tears
That would soak her pillowcase,
And muttered, when it was over, ‘So,
That’s what they mean by ****!’

She cooked him a meal at breakfast time
And thought, ‘He isn’t so bad.’
Then, ‘What if my folks could see me now,
They’d think I was going mad.
I’m cooking a meal for a murderer
Though he says that it wasn’t him,
He thinks that it was his neighbour
So he says, some guy called Jim.’

He stayed three days and was gone that night,
Under a starless sky,
The widow Hayes had grown fond of him,
It was hard to say goodbye.
But the news came back that they cornered him
Had seen him try to escape,
And questioned what she had done with him,
She didn’t mention the ****.

They sent him down at the old Assize,
And sentenced him for his crime,
They wouldn’t believe that it wasn’t him
‘They say that, all of the time!’
He struggled up on the gallows there
With the face of a man who begs,
While she stood near in the Hanging Square,
Stepped up, and pulled on his legs.

David Lewis Paget