The faces of hell
yell out at night with muffled screams
dreams become nightmares
skull hangs loose in a noose
in a tree by the fence.
I heave and sob in the night.
Dull form of a faceless woman hidden inside a cowl
walking down an empty monastic corridor
accompanied by a mad chant
half ecstacy, half misery.
I watch her walk away.
“Take off the cowl and show your face.”
I burn with yearning; I want to scream.
“Turn around and look at me!”
The skull is now a body
dropping down with clack and clatter
into a loosely jointed scarecrow;
bones rattling in the wind
arms flailing limply,
legs kicking out in spastic uselessness.
The skeleton walks into my house
at once both knock-kneed and bow-legged
peering into every nook
looking for a sign of love,
finding none
there is no love in my house.
In other places there is love
a lakeside cabin, a faraway place
Thailand
but not in my house.
The skeleton
is mostly a ghostly reminder
of love once aroused
now dead.
The skeleton goes back to the yard
in the night to the tree,
arms and legs dropping off
as if they were never there.
Just the skull again.
wind dies
skull stops swinging, hanging there
staring through hollow eyes.