Sodden

The moon casts its shadows so long and so grey In a monochrome world that awaits a new day They lock all the gates every night when it’s dark So nobody sees what goes on in the park The quacks and the croaks in an instant abate The scurryings cease dead on ten-fifty-eight The eleventh hour shall hear no owl cry And just before midnight the last bat shall fly No breeze moves the leaves as the park-keeper grieves Leant over his daughter who no longer breathes He was the last and she one before At midnight watched over by so many more With nary a ripple nor watery sound They rise from the pond and they gather around Yet each sodden shadow does not wet the ground As they revisit victims… they’d left to be found Each All Hallows’ Eve such revenge they would wreak For punishments past of which no one would speak The girl would have been the last local to die If he hadn’t heard her last earthly cry Decreed by the folk be they sullen or shocked The park and its pond shall each night be locked That olde village pond where rumours abound… A Halloween hell where witches were drowned