It was curious
that the horror stories
were not false

Believe it
or not
The pairs of glassy eyes
the horrific shadows
the blazing ignes fatui
the strange cold
the ghostly celebration

Termites, spiders, ants
and bats are alive
the rest are dead

The spectres and the skeletons
roam the island
they were **** sapiens

They exist betwixt
the cryptic hallucination
and the paradoxical illusion
**** sapiens is afraid

Winter had arrived
overnight, and

we had slept soundly through it, the
snow smothering

any sounds that dared
try to escape.

The morning arrived clear and sunny
and cold.

I was washing the dishes in that
old kitchen sink of ours when I noticed them—

footprints through the snow in our backyard—I couldn’t
say how many sets there were—

starting at the back fence and
proceeding directly

to our kitchen window. You
told me that you were going to head outside

to shovel the walk, but I told you
that I would take care of it, and I put on

my boots but no jacket, and I walked
out the back door, shovel held tightly

in hand. The tracks traced
the full perimeter of our house—

they appeared to be searching
for something—and they stopped

right outside of her
bedroom window—I couldn’t say

how many sets there were, or how long
they’d stood there while she slept.

I don’t know what
compelled me, but I turned the shovel

over, hurriedly using its edge to scrape
away the footprints there beneath the

window, the grass beneath them still
green and struggling to breathe.

And when I came back inside
you asked me

what I was up to out there, and I told you
that it was too cold

to shovel, that we should put on
another *** of coffee,

that we should stay inside
and not face the day,

and let the children
keep sleeping.

Come hither, Dear Hallows Eve
and covet these sickly sweets  
till porcelain heaves
poor uvula cleaved,
by Sir Grim Reaper’s teeth—

till eyes do burst
like pop rocks cursed
upon the ghost’s white sheets.


Come hither, Dear Hallows Eve.


Come forth, This Villain’s Night,
fair ghouls, you need not hide
and spectres: don’t be shy!
deliver your joyous frights
the witches do abide—

unearth your tombs;
prepare the brooms

and sweep across the sky


on this Villain’s Night.


Come now, Halloween!
hear October’s screams;
the heart’s curdled beat
against my haunted dreams
from which the darkness seeps.

You call me sick
you cry out “trick”

but still I stick to treat—

Yes!

Come now, Halloween!

It's a Saturday night in fall
and I'm the only boy at the slumber party.

Our festivities begin outside,
the cool wind keeping our knees together
as we sit by the pool
and discuss how cool we'll be.

Inside, her parents eye me,
like the Terminator
scanning a potential threat.

We play charades
and twister
and paranoia,
and we laugh and judge and scream.

At 10 p.m. we're told to sleep,
and I sneak up stairs to meet the stirring girls
who giggle in anticipation.

They get to work.
They paint my nails,
They make me up,
and at some point of reflection I see
that
I can no longer see me for me.
We fall asleep.

When I awake,
White pillow caked with
black and fleshy pink,
my friends put me back how they found me -
The only boy at the slumber party.

Forsaken shrine,
Nights align,
In a spotted chalice,
Like onyx wine.
Out rings a bell,
A raven knell,
The wicked cry,
And doleful spell--
     --Of witching's time.

A wayward soul,
On blinded stroll,
As through the dark,
They must patrol.
The traveled path,
A harsh lambast,
And so return,
The hour's bath.

Fore a shape,
A phantom escape,
Awaiting idol,
Past a molten scape.
River quelled,
Fusion's shell,
Lest a shade and shadow weld,
Beware the spell--
     --Of witching's time.

There under a
Full moon
Some teens plat with a oujia board
In the cemetery
They hear howling
From a wolf but they
Ran of at the howling thinking
It was a demon
It was dark and full of
Terrors that night