The ghosts of the living

are just as impolite

when it comes to invading

your dreams

as the dead, the dead, the forgotten

and those that were never really there

but whose screams and howls

carry the night

like a matted grey she-wolf

giving birth on a deserted snow filled

field.

 

The ghosts of the living

taunt you, they criticise and in dreams

their punches, fully weighted,

leave bruises that grow black,

that insult and mock,

even when you know you were right,

they never bruise in return,

as they melt into the background,

to converse and plot with the

diseased mind of King Duncan

whose own ravaged order,

whose once noble thoughts

have passed away to dust.

 

The ghosts of the living,

so full of piss and wind,

of venom that scours

as it scorches the skin

like acid in the heart

of the mind,

where the fingers cannot claw

and scratch it away

like a good itch,

leaves you

in the morning

as sunlight filters through

the darkness beat

cold, alone

and stifling a howl

of rejection.

 

Ian D. Hall 2015