Like a phantom he comes creeping
wearing a hooded cape of gray
which sweeps across the valley floor.
He makes all cars come to a crawl.
Those out walking feel some unease
as he breathes chill breath on their neck.
As eerily as he arrives,
this strange apparition recedes.
#97 on the top 100 poems list as of Aug 11, 2026
I want to be like a spirit free
Of hazel hypocrisy like helium
Blowing up egos and
Puffing up chests
I want to be more but I am not
Born in sin of faulty men
And women who love them
Until they don’t
Then the scales fall from their eyes
Wails build walls tall and emphasized
Love is a crime of passion
Cranberry flavored and rationed
To the green eyed monsters of envy
Seeking what they think is romanticism
Reeling after a taste of pickled realism
For to cherish truly is to sacrifice
Thinking acting in the interest of
Lover despite all the cherry challenges
Keeping vows weathering clouds
With a lavender lyric hidden in heart
I watch the amazing feat of such beauty
And respect realizing I may never really
Destroy the thorns around my red heart
That I’ve decorated and celebrated as
Amethyst art
I am cowardly set in my own ways
A phantom of licorice streets old days
Freely loving old roses pressed pages
For they speak to a heart of safe places
Memories sweet as marmalade
Once sat friend's home who took a vacation
from repainting ~ rooms messy with white tint
tins, paintbrushes, canvas, half painted walls ~
spent week embroidering at garden pool…
On eighth morning awoke to enigma______
house repainted, rearranged, SOUNDLESSLY!
strange blue footprints on porch, on street pavement
weird phantom painting night, friend spieled sea STUNNED !
_________________________
7 lines /7syllables
______________
she was touched by a phantom
becoming a phantom too
both boarded coral carriage
wheels grate cobble streets in mist
opera seats were waiting
then to swirl on dancing floor
she relished escaping hours
(Verse 1)
This empty room still hums your favorite song,
Sunlight cuts the dust where your laugh belonged.
I trace the cracks in every worn-out tile,
Searching for your shadow one more mile.
(Chorus)
**I can still feel you like a phantom limb—**
A ghost in every room, under my skin.
This house is just a cage of might-have-beens...
*I reach for you, but all I touch is wind.*
(Verse 2)
Your coffee cup’s a fossil on the shelf,
I talk to it like I talk to myself.
That sweater in the closet still holds heat,
Smells of rain and old dreams, bittersweet.
(Chorus)
**I can still feel you like a phantom limb—**
A ghost in every room, under my skin.
This house is just a cage of might-have-beens...
*I reach for you, but all I touch is wind.*
(Bridge)
The neighbors say, *"You should turn the page..."*
But how do I quit a ghost I still stage?
These walls rehearse the echo of your name—
A silent fire only you could tame.
(Outro Chorus)
**I can still feel you like a phantom limb...**
*(Whispered, fading)*
*...All I touch is wind.*
There once was a phantom phone caller
Who rang numbers he hadn't oughta
Some fell for his charms
Some raised the alarm
Now the caller finds he's in deep water.
One day he rang someone that he knew
Thinking that they hadn’t got a clue
They knew who he was
Sent for the police squad
He got locked up as idiots do.
Worse thing about being in a cell
Was being without a phone, it was hell
He twiddled his thumbs
All day and night long
Till his finger digits started to swell.
He cried for he wanted his mother
And also his sister and brother
But they didn’t care
Just left him in there
It couldn’t have been any tougher.
His dad was the only one who cared
“You’ll be out very soon son” he sweared
He climbed the cell wall
But had a big fall
“You’re arrested” an officer declared.
They see my outline, never my core
A silhouette against their expectations.
Their whispers trail behind me like shadows,
Interpretations I never authorized.
I speak in colors they refuse to see,
My words are distorted through their clouded lens.
When I reach out, they flinch from phantom claws,
Reading threats into my outstretched hands.
I am tired of this constant translation,
Of shrinking myself to fit their narrow frame.
The wild truth of me beats against my ribs,
Demanding air, demanding space to grow.
Beyond these walls of judgment and assumption
Lies a world unmarked by their definitions.
I long to shed this skin of their perception,
To step outside and breathe without their gaze.
Not exile, but freedom that I seek
To be neither monster nor myth,
But simply myself, uninterpreted,
Authentic under an open sky.????????????????
Amidst the ebon of my lonely room
I feel a covert brush across my face.
The phantom from my dreams disrupts the gloom,
which terminates despair's profound embrace.
Her mystic coffee eyes entrance my soul
as freedom's blanket warms my frigid heart.
This charmer's stitch has sealed seclusion's hole,
now dammed, the flow of somber tears will part.
My trusting fingers grasp her guiding hand
as flames of adoration burn within.
I bow before her sensual command
and let the blaze of passion's fire begin.
We sail the sea of fascination's kiss
and bathe in waves of rapture's soft caress,
then anchored at the dock of Eden's bliss,
we mingle on the beach at love's address.
My spirit's flooded by enchantment's rain,
which resurrects a buried peace inside.
Beneath the midnight moon she's freed all pain.
Upon her magic ship my dreams now ride.
I've never, ever seen my dog,
'Cause he does not exist.
I try to explain this fact to him,
But the truth he does resist.
He says to me, "I have no bowl."
I say, "You do not eat."
He says, "We never go for walks."
I say, "You have no feet."
But he insists, "I bark all day."
I say, "No one can hear."
And he persists, "I chase the cats."
I say, "They do not fear."
These awful truths enrage him so,
He says that he will fight me!
I say to him, "You have no teeth,
How are you going to bite me?"
He sadly runs away from me,
In a hurry to depart.
I fear I may have wounded him,
Though I know he has no heart.
He sits alone in his doghouse,
Like him it is not there,
Howling at the lonely Moon,
And only I'm aware.
What to do about this phantom dog?
Only one thing, I feel.
Tomorrow, I'll go to the pound,
And try to make him real.
the town of Jingbut
had a ding
that chimed and chimed
did ring and ring
and a mystery
was this loudly thing
for over air
and garden came
straight through house
each room the same
for where you were
it did not wane
an all around
an everywhere
incessant ringing
to the ear
an omnipresent
far and near
it was a witch
as told by some
whose voice aloud
when she was hung
a curse to all
she deathfully sung
others tell
of murdering
or ghost or phantom
or of goblin
a demon’s
episodic rambling
then just as quick
as it had started
it wasn’t there
as strange it ended
gone, gone
but for how long
no-one knew
why it had been
but oft it rang
this haunting ring
that held the town
the Jingbut ding
Words are phantom neckties
in and out of style they go
From parsimony to paisley
ignominious to indigo
From wide to narrow
sissified to antihero
Here today, gone tomorrow
their return, beg or borrow
Surely there is a phantom here
As I jerk my head in sudden fear
Praying for those I hold so dear
Sensing movement that is very near
If it happened just the one time
I'd dismiss it as nickel-and-dime
But more than once - has to be sublime
And this happens in the daytime
Birds on the feeder are not shaken
And my senses are not mistaken
So this cannot be godforsaken
But prayers the phantom has a stake in
We do not know how we should pray
So this phantom helps us in His way
With groanings we cannot hear or say
Interceding for us as we pray
I must testify to the Spirit's aid
His assistance is deeply laid
Great care and effort powerfully made
Our prayers to the Father conveyed
The phantom of the opera,
once bitter and marose,
living in torture chambers,
almost comatose,
has got a new publicist.
Don't write his epitaph.
Now, he's bright and cheerful,
signing autographs.
The phantom of the opera was sincere,
but, with him, I wouldn't want to share a beer.
Not only that, but furthermore, in any case,
have you ever happened to see his face?
A spectral figure, clothed in red,
he had no face upon his head.
High o'er Paris on an opera house roof,
she described that phantom goof -
here is what our pretty Christine said
about our hero whom she had misled,
"he's a monster, a loathsome beast",
an understatement, to say the least.
Stars sparkle in the black velvet sky
Lit with orange and red
Meteor appears as a shooting star
A bright streak of light
Across the heavens
The moon, a lovely crescent
A midnight gust blows overhead
The darkest ink lays before dawn
Arrives the bewitching hour
When the veil between life and death
Is at its weakest
Phantom limbs intertwine
And witches cast their spell
I wake up unsettled with a cold sweat
When supernatural activity is at its greatest
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