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Jeff Lewis Mar 11
with its creaking door

it's not the hooting owl
across a cemetery

not dark of night

not goblins, ghouls, or ghosts

no specter haunts me.

but

that song
those places
times left to slip away
hurts that never heal
memories to forget
as if I could

that
haunts
me
Ezis Jan 21
I ended the only relationship I've ever had.

After four years I told him I didn't want to get married.
"So you want to get married but just not to me?"

I revisit that day in my sleep every night. The day that I took the plane to do it right. Boston far below.
"You have completely broken my heart."

My brother by my side at the departure and arrival. The sumner tunnel under construction and $300 in jet fuel later.
"I want you to be gone when I come out of the bathroom."

A few months prior he told me that dating me was "bliss". I knew it hadn't been that for me.
"Is this it? Are you done with me just like that?"

I told him that he was taking me for granted and I couldn't talk to him when I needed him most. Hiding my mental illness should he think I'm broken.
"Just because I don't ask how your day is does mean I don't care."

He flew to Boston not 12 hours later. Even during his grand gesture he couldn't help but criticize me.
"Stand up straight."

He told me he thought suicide was selfish. How was I to tell him I had considered parking my car on the highway bridge over the Merrimack river and jumping off? A women did that the first week I lived here, so I knew it would work.
"I thought about putting a gun in my mouth and pulling the trigger."

My best friend told me he asked her for her name. I'd been dating him for three years. Pop quiz: Who is your girlfriend's best friend and roommate? Did he even listen to me speak at all? Did he even care about my life at all?
"Whats your name again?"

Three months later, I only see you when I sleep. I'm haunted by this memory. I never dream we are still together and I wonder what that means. I've broken up with you a hundred times but it doesn't get any easier.
"Tell me everything you don't like about me. Give me a list."
Jeremy Betts Jan 6
I got a *** to **** in but this **** in this ***,
It's all I got
When confronted with that Eminem talk, that proverbial one shot
I gotta stop saying, "sure, why not?"
First of all, what a crock
Secondly, IT'S FUUCKING NOT!
Forgot a lot but never lost the plot
Though I find myself oblivious to subplots a lot
Flames are hot, can't say the left sink handles not
But the one with a label is not the one too hot too handle,
Lessons learned on the spot
Connecting lines, lost a dot
...gotta be a 'bot...
Fasten a sloppy slipknot, keep it taunt
Toss it up over the branch to swing from, now I have a forest to haunt
Awake or asleep, absorbing the same onslaught
What's fake, what's not?
Sunken eye socket, looking gaunt
Believe it or not, it's only ever been just an ink blot
Write my theory in ransom font
Look for the proof, there's a lot
Go one step further than you were taught
Always remember it could all be for not
That's why you'll find me on a canvas cot of rot to rot in the back corner of Salem's lot
A set with a pre dug spot for a later point in the plot
That is if I can survive the death scene in the pilot
AKA a nobody that not just somebody but everybody forgot
Only thing that sticks around are the demons I fought
Tell me, whatcha got?

©2024
Too Much
Not Enough
Too Much
Not Enough
Too Much
Not Enough
Too Much
Not Enough

Time can haunt your head
Reminding you of death
Take control of you
If you allow it to


Too Much
Not Enough
Too Much
Not Enough
Too Much
Not Enough
Too Much
Not Enough

Timmmmmmmmmmme

(c) Debra Lea Ryan
04/01/2024
4th piece of an concept  album project idea. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6AnXLnMMAg
Faith Dec 2023
Do the malevolent poltergeists of my past haunt your benevolent spirit?
When I ride through my ghost-towns like an old west gunslinger,
Will the ricochets shatter your fragile glass house?
If I slash through phantom limbs, is it your blood that I spill on the altar of revenge?
Do all the periods of falling leaves and sundowns I spend at the graveyard
Will away the only real wisps of life I know?
Jeremy Betts May 2023
Enjoy the mocking tick after tock from the clock as the hands race monotony just to land on a preoccupied spot, no over shot
Reality not taught, reason is a subplot, lost in translation was the caveat, what's the grand plan for this life span time forgot
Avoiding deaths cousin, the sandman, only shortened the journey to the grand finale at the bottom of a grave plot, a hateful fate fought
Thought I ought not move to avoid falling through the bottom of all rock bottoms due to the dry rot, a quicksand sandbox in back of Salems lot
Rescue or recovery a long shot, no one within earshot but there's an onslaught of inner dialogue piercing the void like the scream of a red hot teapot
As is common with the distraught I sought help from the cold embrace of a slipknot that grew taut through the progression of this thrown together plot of a should've been cancelled pilot
Don't ask me what I see in this blind study of an inkblot, any sanity you got would crumble if caught up in the web of nightmare fuel my own mind went ahead and brought
Forced to boycott my being, can't connect good story lines, lost a dot, popped a squat in a thousand watt recliner like a pre-programmed self destruct robot
Self-preservation an afterthought, miles out to sea before I realized I've not yet bought a yacht, treading water in a tough spot
Messed around and got so high I got caught in the sky like a drifting astronaut lost in space, tethered to a dead cosmonaut
A crackpot juggernaut of supreme disappointment, walk the walk and take a potshot at a what not to do mascot
Cross my i's and dot t's with the underutilized comic sans faunt that don't nobody want, awoken by the taunt of a witching hour haunt
"Fuuck the record and fuuck the people!" like you heard from Snot, you'll probably be hearing it from me a lot
Before I become a forget-me-not long forgot but go or stay, either way, still dangerous as a traveling blood clot
The good fight was not fought, this life was not sought, everyone seems to have it together, I'm the biggest have not on the block
Do with that what you will, I'm going on a long walk down a short dock with a giant rock in each sock
Then the plan is to mock god to his face and see the shock on his face as I say I could do better and see if I get the morning stars spot

I mean, why not? It's worth a shot

©2023
Myrrdin Jun 2023
You sounded just like someone
I've spent the last 5 years burying
I wondered how I could have
Risen the dead yet again
My very posture a seance
Welcoming the past
Like the welcome mat
The ghosts pass over
On their way in
I never opened the door
I swear
I guess I just left it unlocked
I begged you to leave me alone
But the exorcist said
It's so impolite to ask the ghost to leave
If you're the reason their dead in the first place.
Coleen Mzarriz Dec 2022
The slit between the roof and the abandoned house gets me—the moon drowns in his own mystical clouds, wavering and so full of light.

I squint my eyes as the moon hides his presence from me. Almost knowing I had captured it with my own eyes and the grey clouds scattered like waves, consuming my breath and taking it away.

He knows it still haunts me from time to time and he gave his best to give me an embrace—even when my very own existence is running cold and dry and my breath thickens with the mist of unwavering thoughts coming from the night and the stars twinkle at the sight of people looking at them—like a mirrorball entertaining strangers from the club and they shine in their spot. Even when I close my eyes, the moon peaks in its stillness. All the poets used him as their muse, radiating this mellow one could think of when the sun sleeps in her slumber. The poets had perfectly described him in thousands of words and painted him over the mural where I can see him directly and the strangeness of him calms the raging waters in me.

Even when peace is quite chaotic and chaos is peaceful, a trap between the slit on the roof and the abandoned house, squinting my eyes as the moon hides his presence from me. And she haunts me as the sun begins to show herself in ways I am blinded by her light.

In some ways, she shines even when it is night.
In a way, she looks over the moon when he wakes up from his slumber.
In a way, the stars and clouds enveloped her with the warmness of their breath.
In some ways, I couldn’t look at her for too long.
In some ways, I am silenced by her beauty.
Wrote this around October and as I’m scrolling through my notes, I found this. Glad I still have this poem.
Serendipity Jul 2022
I pray that the ghosts
that haunt my bones
and the demons
that line my skin
know what they are doing
because I don't.
Jenn Gardner Dec 2021
Even after all of this time,
you still ******* haunt me.

Your specter lingers in the earth beneath my feet.
Sticking to my shoes as I try to walk away.

You are a poltergeist acting through me.

Making me think that you are everyone,
Everyone is you.
And love is just a mask you wear.

All the times I told myself,
that trust meant falling victim.

It was you
With your tendrils wrapped around my skull,
Whispering in my ear.
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