Halloween Poems

It's Halloween! Michael R. Burch If evening falls on graveyard walls far softer than a sigh; if shadows fly moon-sickled skies, while children toss their heads uneasy in their beds, beware the witch's eye! If goblins loom within the gloom till playful pups grow terse; if birds give up their verse to comfort chicks they nurse, while children dream weird dreams of ugly, wiggly things, beware the serpent's curse! If spirits scream in haunted dreams while ancient sibyls rise to plague nightmarish skies one night without disguise while children toss about uneasy, full of doubt, beware the Devil's lies... it's Halloween! Thin Kin Michael R. Burch Skeleton! Tell us what you lack... the ability to love, your flesh so slack? Will we frighten you, grown as pale & unsound, when we also haunt the unhallowed ground? The Witch Michael R. Burch her fingers draw into claws she cackles through rotting teeth... u ask "are there witches?" pshaw! (yet she has my belief) Vampires Michael R. Burch Vampires are such fragile creatures; we dread the dark, but the light destroys them... sunlight, or a stake, or a cross: such common things. Still, late at night, when the bat-like vampire sings, we shrink from his voice. Centuries have taught us: in shadows danger lurks for those who stray, and there the vampire bares his yellow fangs and feels the ancient soul-tormenting pangs. He has no choice. We are his prey, plump and fragrant, and if we pray to avoid him, he prays to find us... prays to some despotic hooded God whose benediction is the humid blood he lusts to taste. Revenge of the Halloween Monsters Michael R. Burch The Halloween monsters, incensed, keep howling, and may be UNFENCED! They’re angry that children with treats keep throwing their trash IN THE STREETS! You can check it out on your computer: Google says, “Please don’t be a POLLUTER!” The Halloween monsters agree, so if you’re a litterbug, FLEE! Kids, if you’d like more treats this year and don’t want to cower in FEAR, please make all the mean monsters happy, and they’ll hand out sweet treats like they’re sappy! So if you eat treats on the drag and don't want huge monsters to nag, please put all loose trash in your BAG! Pale Though Her Eyes Michael R. Burch Pale though her eyes, her lips are scarlet from drinking of blood, this child, this harlot born of the night and her heart, of darkness, evil incarnate to dance so reckless, dreaming of blood, her fangs, white, baring, revealing her lust, and her eyes, pale, staring... Like Angels, Winged Michael R. Burch Like angels: winged, shimmering, misunderstood, they flit beyond our understanding being neither evil, nor good. They are as they are... and we are their lovers, their prey; they seek us out when the moon is full and dream of us by day. Their eyes, hypnotic, alluring, trap ours with their strange appeal till like flame-drawn moths, we gather... to see, to touch, to feel. Held in their arms, enchanted, we feel their lips, so old!, till with their gorging kisses we warm them, growing cold. Solicitation Michael R. Burch He comes to me out of the shadows, acknowledging my presence with a tip of his hat, always the gentleman, and his eyes are on mine like a snake’s on a bird’s: quizzical, mesmerizing. He cocks his head as though something he heard intrigues him (although I hear nothing) and he smiles, amusing himself at my expense; his words are full of desire and loathing, and while I hear everything, he says nothing I understand. The moon shines, maniacal, *****, as he takes my hand whispering "Our time has come"...And so we stroll together creaking docks where the sea sends sickening things scurrying under rocks and boards. Moonlight washes his ashen face as he stares unseeing into my eyes. He sighs, and the sound crawls slithering down my spine; my blood seems to pause at his touch as he caresses my face. He unfastens my dress till the white lace shows, and my neck is bared. His teeth are long, yellow and hard, his face bearded and haggard. A wolf howls in the distance. There are no wolves in New York. I gasp. My blood is a trickle his wet tongue embraces. My heart races madly. He likes it like that. Siren Song Michael R. Burch The Lorelei’s soft cries entreat mariners to save her... How can they resist her faint voice through the mist? Soon she will savor the flavor of sweet human flesh. The Wild Hunt Michael R. Burch Near Devon, the hunters appear in the sky with Artur and Bedwyr sounding the call; and the others, laughing, go dashing by. They only appear when the moon is full: Valerin, the King of the Tangled Wood, and Valynt, the goodly King of Wales, Gawain and Owain and the hearty men who live on in many minstrels’ tales. They seek the white stag on a moonlit moor, or Torc Triath, the fabled boar, or Ysgithyrwyn, or Twrch Trwyth, the other mighty boars of myth. They appear, sometimes, on Halloween to chase the moon across the green, then fade into the shadowed hills where memory alone prevails. Nevermore! Michael R. Burch Nevermore! O, nevermore! shall the haunts of the sea: the swollen tide pools and the dark, deserted shore, mark her passing again. And the salivating sea shall never kiss her lips nor caress her breasts and hips, as she dreamt it did before, once, lost within the uproar. The waves will never rape her, nor take her at their leisure; the sea gulls shall not have her, nor could she give them pleasure... She sleeps, forevermore! She sleeps forevermore, a virgin save to me and her other lover, who lurks now, safely smothered by the restless, surging sea. And, yes, they sleep together, but never in that way... For the sea has stripped and shorn the one I once adored, and washed her flesh away. He does not stroke her honey hair, for she is bald, bald to the bone! And how it fills my heart with glee to hear them sometimes cursing me out of the depths of the demon sea... their skeletal love, impossibility!