Lugosi Béla is dead. Ligeti György is dead. The bat flies past the closet door. The closet is filled with corpses, screaming to let them out. The grey house cries out in a voice of silence. The wood cracks under my feet as I break through the door. Relative ease getting in, but I fear getting out might take all my power. I look towards the door, but it is so far. I decide to go in, towards a familiar stench. I hear screams from the attic and moans from the basement. Ligeti's breath. That was the stench. Wonderful. I take a huge whiff and feel high. I meet him. He is dead, yet he's smiling at me. I kiss him on the lips, for he is deserving of love, like the others. I leave the room and let him sleep in silence. I hope my love got to him. As soon as I get through the door, a set of red eyes. Wings, chapping my shoulders. I am pinned against a wall. Teeth sink into my neck. It is Lugosi. I kiss him on the lips, as he demands, and begin to leave. He disappears, for he's dead. Undead. But that seems like years ago and I'm still not at the door. In fact, it's been a decade. It's the morning now, and I cannot leave. I feel like... I'm dying? But I feel more alive, as well. As I reach the door, I fall.
I wake up in an unfamiliar room. They are both there. They don't present me with a choice. They are leaving all of their belongings to me. White on white translucent black capes. Black on black glasses of *****. The bats have left the bell tower. The victims have been bled. Red velvet lines the black box. Virginal brides file past their tombs. Strewn with time's dead flowers, Bereft in deathly bloom, I'm alone in a darkened room.
I am Ligeti. I am Lugosi. I am neither and I am both. I am dead and I am not. As I live and breathe. I am... The count.
My 50th poem on this website and I go back to my roots.