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Cauldron smoke riseslike gray ghosts dancing —Translucent gossamer beingsseeking escape from the boil.Twisted fingerstorture them into the air–higher and higheruntil first one, then alldisappear.Out of the black more come,souls flying like eyeless insects, grotesquebut freebecause of the Christmas soup.Continue Reading

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Poltergeist – German origin, “knocking ghost”. You’re not going to believe me, but we got geisted, geisted good and hard. But before we get into that, why don’t we start from scratch. I’ve never been a fan of fabrics that conceal—shower curtains especially, for all the obvious insert-horror-film-scene-here reasons, butContinue Reading

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Lea discovers the photographwhile sorting through the layersof Granddad’s life, cleaningthe mess that so many years of livingleaves behind. Wedged in the seamof a cardboard box, a black and whitepicture of a little boy—dark hair,round cheeks, wide mouth.As soon as Lea sees him, she can hearhis voice in her head,Continue Reading

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As soon as August heat breaks, weatherbecomes a drug, pulls us deep into the woods along the riverbank.Otters romp and roll in the cool stream. Pallid walnut leaves fall from brittlestems where children wait on the school bus. Silky cobwebs cluster in porch corners& branches we bushwhack early mornings. TemperaturesContinue Reading

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How had the intruder gotten in? Not through the dead-bolted door to our fourth-story apartment. Not through the windows. I couldn’t see his face. Our bedroom was too dark. My husband was thirty miles away at Johns Hopkins Hospital on a ventilator with a tube down his throat. To preventContinue Reading

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What is the difference between fog and cloud, vision and ectoplasm? I lean into vapor, into you,planchette straining to letters of your name.I am candleflame, spark and flicker, votive.You are ghost, opalescent and translucent.Hovering mist. Virga.I see you in winter breath, steam rising like a promise from my cup.I carryContinue Reading

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His steel katanaCleaves its wayThrough air swiftlyLike a dragonflyThrough would-beThieves and killersWith their lustfulEyes set on aSingle woman in aCrimson silk kimonoCarnation-pink sashAround her waistAlone and defencelessBut primarily onHer ribboned purseFull of ryo— A stillborn crime—A bright streamOf loosened blood—A scattered messOf dead fools—The lone samuraiOn horsebackRides off, hoofbeatsKicking upContinue Reading

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Straw-bodiedCorpseAlarminglyRed-headed, sporting his Rockabilly pompadour;Effigy gangly-toothed,Cropped, andRickety after the manner of Rumpelstiltskin:Overalls ransacked from the ragbag by ramshackle moonlight,Warding away zombie-feathered crows.Continue Reading

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Ghosts point their cold fingersdown from the roof–long narrow prisms holding lightthen gone.The sununderstands their chilly spirit–encourages them to dance–then with a quick tempo–drip drip crack–a strong spring breathfrees them from their perchlike a maestro’s batoncounting a beat.Continue Reading

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They said in ancient Greece and Rome and suchlocales—and maybe everywhere, I guess—that household gods—say, ancestors’—would lookupon us in the home, as from an urnwith ashes in it on a mantelpiece—or even absent ashes or the vase. But I have my Italian grandfather’sold grooming scissors, made when things would last,andContinue Reading