spook

there are black-dark 

and dripping shadows

in the moonless corners of my eyes

momentary, melting ink blots

a makeshift mind whispering 

tiny tricks of mourning silks

i am only a tired surgical experiment

with one foot in the curdling soil 

of the churchyard after nightfall and

these nights there's a tall man

with a heavy brown hat and 

gull-eyes i swear are real

rising from white mist like

sea-spray gone awry

a spectral souffle of dead flesh

he might stare from doorways while i sleep

he might grip my white throat until i wake

(pale and voiceless and water-eyed)

there's one hundred tiny ants 

seanced and swarming 

in a rotting black boil

on the closet floor 

with the wormy pine 

shall i feed him my terror

piece by piece 

to appease his crooked smile,

that crusty vigil?

then in dawn's derisive, jaundiced glow 

just wet and murky footprints

on the swollen hardwood

muffled moonshine and oil drips

two hundred drowned mice 

and black teeth beneath me

but this is no sumpter to dredge

and that old man will find no gold here

all muck and sand and spoiled snails so

mama sparkles holy water

six ways til sunday

(pour it in a glass mama, 

let me drink it up)

her mouth swirling psalms

she slips rosary beads 

beneath my pillow

to help me dream 

of something lighter

but the weight 

of three hundred locusts 

on my rooting chest 

spins my breaths shallow

and no one's arms, 

not the lord's

not the ghost's

not even his

can lift it 

this is ouija-sins 

and sweeping second hands

this is 3ams 

and army barracks

this is me seeing things 

that are not there

(i wish you would unearth me like 

the graverobbers do -- steal all my gold

then leave me to rot)

light the sage daddy, please light the cedar

and let the smoke carry me to sleep this time