black ghosts, white ghosts
line my lane, ether's balloons
watching the night,
calling to me

what does thou see
mourner in the flesh, others?
fainter apparitions, silent
even to us

you won’t find him, they say,
no soul stays close to home, we fell
in distant moors and this night, we are
the whispers in your thatched roof,
rain strolling down your old stones
fog rolling from the ponds

but, he will be
wafting over another's hedge,
far from the glens where you threw him
the ball, miles from the roads where
he road his bike

he won’t be near
the blackened stacks by the tracks
where a strange body found him,
transformed him into one of us
with a blade honed for
eternity…before
that night

one ever sharp,
even though it was thrown
into the Avon before your boy
was cold

look for your lad, your love
in the wild sea, in the shapes waves weave
blue on sunny days; he will be there
not black or white like we

you will find him, ever
near, though far from where
you look