Nightmare Lullaby

I am standing in the dark.
Suddenly there is a keyboard
around me
like a corkscrew
reaching up, farther than I can see

The floor is gone.
I am floating
with the black and white keys
spiraling down,
down
and disappearing
to a
point.

I begin to play.
The tune is discordant
full of dread
but I can’t stop.

I feel the flapping of wings
just beyond my face,
just out of view

When I look down my hands have
turned into knives
stabbing the
keys which
now spurt blood
everywhere.
And still the dreadful
song goes on

 

Over in the Imaginary Garden with Real Toads, Bjorn has shown us some nightmarish art and asked us to write about our own nightmares.  Click on the link and check it out.

The Art of Winter

-Photo by Mary Bach

There is a beauty in
negative spaces,
in winter,
in life drawing down
to a
point
 
the stark dark and light
of trees and snow,
of moon and night
of hunger and time,
thickening, lengthening, slowing
blown by winds
drifting at our door
beautiful and dangerous
call to us
 
winter draws us down
to the bone

 

This is 55+ for the Imaginary Garden with Real Toads where we are asked to write 55 words on the topic of our choosing, and if we would like to deal with some pairing of two things.  Click on the link and check it out.

Grand Finale

The November temple is empty
the sacrifice finished.
Leaves scatter in the wind;
branches snap
like dry bones
of an unearthed skeleton.

The hole
in my graveyard chest
is empty
and black birds pick
at the pearls
which were my eyes.
 
Houdini’s midnight cape
settles with a flourish.
The show is over.

Sky Light

You
and I
we build
a scaffolding
of
sighs
reaching to
the closer
clouds

our fears
are not
of flying
but of
falling

back
to earth
with those
who go about
their lives

as if
the sky
was only

empty

as if
it did
not contain
wonders

as if
it was not
the threshold to

heaven

 

By Mary Bach, previously published at http://writinginthebachs.blogspot.com/2014/11/sky-light.html