Janitor Ghost

When the owls are out of town his studded boots kick-up featherless hoots. He is the creak and groan of tired wood, The splutter of an old aircon yet more; all inexplicable noises belong to him. He crawls through crawl spaces to prop up places. A chunky phantom who tinkers with gurgling drains. He's the one who unplugs the unpluggable, then trips the fuse box at night while you pee. I hear him stumble bent between rafters, imagine his bum crack mooning cobwebs and shadows. He wheezes through long unheeded chores. A maintenance ghost grumbling as he bends over a beer belly, that unseen plumber who rattles shaky pipes, working hard on his night shift, He's a clatter in the crapper, patching up leaks between colliding worlds, nudging our sleep as we cover ears in our fretful dreams.