We talked about ghosts at work
There are slaves in the attic
Where the floorboards creak
We have seen glasses and plates
break, untouched, Our house was built on Southern ground
in 1861

We talked about premonitions
There were brothers dead in train crashes
Where the steam boiled and metal buckled
And sisters finding body parts in their sleep

When I dream
I see my mother
Are you real? I ask
I can't be asleep again
Just more so now...

She takes my hand with cold soft
fingers she smells like her
hand cream her eyes make little 'm'
bird wing creases her face is smiling
the way it always has she does not
bother with mascara she sits bright
and hunched in tallness

Are you real? I ask
I'm real. She says

I wonder if tonight I'll dream of slaves
The floorboards creaking
Or of brothers
And their hands thrown in train crashes
Landing under metal somewhere
In the woods nearby
Of wholeness,
Whatever being haunted means

I am scared that nothing I do makes a difference I am scared I feel all of history pounding in my head I am happy to see her even being less real, sleeping
**even if she is *more so now