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"Who Put Luebella down the Wych Elm?"

There are rumours
about me, some 
come seeking me
with their geiger counters
and ouji boards
with their heart 
shaped planchettes

unanswered questions
in the woods, crackling
within the sounds of leaves
invisible dead things speaking 
underfoot white noise
boxes that ghosts 
are meant to genuinely
speak through 

radio signals 
code
for decoding 

intrepid other spectrals 
that touch the soil
let it slip 
through their fingers, 
like time;
they say, they can sense me,
feel me still, through that
mere touch 

they listen 
but do not 
speak to me
as such;
what was once,
all now seems
forgotten and lost;

there are rumours
about me, they say
I was found 
in the hollow
of dead life,
for a short 
spell

in the middle of 
the woods, the
wych elm and 
all that, they say
I am a witch 
but that’s present tense,
the past would make it
"was", but just because

the whispers suggest,
a hand of glory 
separated and lit,
doesn't mean, 
it was; if they could
just piece the story
correctly, 
bit by insane bit;

then others, say, that 
I used these slender bones
once covered in flesh 
with the urgent pressing 
of fingertips, to transmit 
more singular 
compelling signals; 

some say, I passed
once upon a life 
for intelligence,
I adroitly consider
perhaps they have
their wires crossed,

I now think intelligence 
is in the eyes and beaks 
of birds, hair taken for 
weaving nests, skin 
carrion fed for hungry 
creatures all wanting
to be fed, there was 
plenty of me, once,
I was a plentiful feast;

they say, you know, 
I arrived obscure, 
undercover
of darkness, covertly
urgent, very important
special missions,
regrettably terribly
unfruitful 

I was set 
from the get-go
to be seen unseen 
to be 
quiet and 
quite 
unremarkable,

no records of me 
to be found, 
not even in the 
top secret 
jerry can 
records,
I was considered 
naive

I never existed
you see, 
missing passport
birth certificate
medical records
the history of teeth
no loose lips here

then, 
all the intrigue
perhaps, they say
the parachute business?

same deal, 
different kind of witches, 
some say experienced,
some say over-adventurous,
untrained novices

landing within 
enemy lines, 
always.

I got 
all tangled up 
in the trees
and landed 
down the 
$hit shute
just like that;

perhaps, 
some suggest
I was 'just a'
passing loose
thread 
between two men
at the local tavern, there are
so many different types ...

of witchy women,
all branded 
for the slow burn 
blacksheep and 
scapegoats
escaping something 
all on their own
very special 
mysterious missions;

they say, perhaps
this witch 
drank too much 
and the special mission
came to a halting crunch 
strangled in the back of 
a serially offensive 
humber super snipe

crepe soled shoes 
dancing in thin air, 
the warm tight hands
of a slick lizard squeezing 
some foreign kind of love
life rationed out of
the useless vessel like toothpaste
from a disposable body 
mistakenly overcompensated
covered in cheap perfume

a soulless kiss 
no je t’adore
perhaps a blessing, 
last thoughts
from the dark smokey pall, 
"no street walking 
anymore"

and before 
rigour mortis
set in, these resourceful 
how should we put it,
gentlemen? encased me 
possibly still breathing 

within the dead limbs 
of the wych 
like a 
sleeping baby,
to teach me a lesson
upon waking, 
never to take that 
trip again;

nevertheless, 
whichever way 
you looked at it 
I was trapped 
alive, or dead 
on the money, they say,
all's fair in love and war;

there like an unwrapped
mummy, I dreamt
of a child once embraced, 
now lost like a paradox
tightly overprotected
by the limbs
of a deadly
wych elm tree

kind of poetic, 
wouldn’t you say?

there is no going back
to before what was, 
past tense.

present tense,
I am now somewhere
hidden and undiscovered
in a dusty box 
of unclaimed bric-a-brac,
an unsolved mystery;

of course, such a great 
to-do for a while, 
messages written on 
stone walls, investigators 
all perplexed, vacinity of
crime and all that…

my remains 
were gathered
and photographed 
by starched coats 
and soft shoes
witnessing 
the hand detached
at a distance
from the ghoulish body

no tap dancing fingers
no piano playing scores
no turning keys
no touching faces
physically opening 
doors, throwing
panting dogs
balls

perhaps some fox or rat
perhaps for a gypsy thief
my digits and palm 
stewed slowly with 
eery incantations 
a waxy token
like a candle lit

all for the hand of glory
the cards were dealt
an eye for an eye
war zones of some sort
behind enemy lines
in one way or another

I was despatched.
some curious cats 
still seeking the full story.

they say, 
the piece of peach
petticoat found in my throat,
was torn by a boy 
who poaching for eggs, 
reaching into the 
sharp brambles of the thing,
quite shockingly found 
my macabre skeletal head

then, not wanting 
to be found
to be on the 
wrong side, of the fence,
that would be 
the lordly 
overseer’s  grounds, 
took about tearing
part of my frock 

and on sturdy twig stick,
afixed the shred and 
poking it into my 
bony, yet thankfully 
voiceless throat,
gingerly wedged 
me ("the ghastly thing")
back into the womb 
of the wych

the creatures and 
the whispering 
foliaged limbs 
of the forest 
all know 
by now,
the true story 

unlike humans,
they see me 
come and go,
sometimes 
being familiar
with the other, 
we speak of that time 
long ago and 
mercilessly laugh
over it all

I am with them all now
shapeshifting through 
portals, there’s no 
coming back
to the once was, 
I am close to 
elemental

tied to darker realms
the ones who took me 
down, well, 
their days are spent
in a kind of 
swinging door hell
I’m with them always 
now, like the woman in black 

they're in my hell

haunting 
limitless dimensions 
leading them through 
strange labyrinths
a shadow 
of my former self

the mystery unsolved
the story still waits
like an unclaimed
dance without a card
sitting on a shelf


(LadyLabyrinth / 2023)
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