Horror Flicks
I was 8 when I saw
the scariest movie ever made.
Already, Vincent Price was God to me:
The Pit and The Pendulum,
House of Ushers,
Haunted Hill.
I loved scary movies,
probably because they were
forbidden.
Rosemary's Baby and
The Exorcist were
ancient before I saw them.
Mother didn't like horror flicks,
or TV;
her rules included
only ½ hour of TV a day,
and NO horror flicks.
Mother didn't like a lot of things
I did.
She kept the TV in the basement
near the washer and dryer;
laundry was one of my Saturday chores;
Saturday afternoon was
a great time for horror flicks –
provided you kept the volume low,
stayed in arms reach of the dial
in case she came down.
That's how I found
Vincent Price,
"Night of the Living Dead",
"The Thing", and "The Blob" –
sitting in a damp, cement basement,
tiny windows barely showing sunlight,
a load of towels at my side.
Deformed monsters,
who weren't really evil,
just misunderstood or
unable to control themselves,
meeting untimely deaths
at the hands of heroes
who weren't really that heroic.
I'd miss a lot of the movie, though.
Mother knew what I was doing;
she came down often,
afraid of my nightmares.
But there was only one flick
that gave me that kind of terror.
I was 8 years old –
Mother, my aunt, my sister and I
at the drive in.
On the screen, a man offered children candy
Don't take it, Don't take it
Don't you remember what mother always said?
But they did take it,
and they'd follow him into his house
and, one by one, the children
would disappear.
And the man didn't do it because
he was misunderstood or
couldn't control himself –
no, he hurt little kids for no reason except
they misbehaved once too often.
The townspeople knew it
and they cheered and laughed
and threw a party
and the parents told the kids
it was ok to go with this stranger.
I couldn't watch.
I sat on the floor behind the seat
cried hysterically –
screamed to drown out
the man's laughter and song.
About halfway through,
my aunt started the car,
Mother looked at me like
I'd lost all the sense I'd never had.
Behind us, a little girl turned into a blueberry
as Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory
continued to play for the cheering cars.
Winter Solstice
Winter is here.
The longest night and
Charon's cloak covers
the Northern hemisphere.
They say
you want something
upbeat
but Winter Solstice
isn't party time...
white dresses, daisy crowns.
It heralds the season
of death ... rest ... waiting
hiding beneath Charon's cloak
on the longest night of the year.
Still
you want something
upbeat.
When grass turns brown and
flowers disappear
under the snow and dark
in temporary death
slumbering until spring,
hiding beneath Charon's cloak
on the longest night of the year.
Ah,
you want something
upbeat.
But sleeping plants don't
really cause us fear.
It's the ferryman's ride
in the season of rest
makes you fear the dark
hiding beneath Charon's cloak
on the longest night of the year.
Yes,
you want something
upbeat.
Why are we afraid
to just be afraid,
to be a small rabbit
scurrying for cover,
without a dirt hole,
hiding beneath Charon's cloak
on the longest night of the year?
And
you want something
upbeat.
He was thirty-two,
married seven months,
but the cancer took four,
and it doesn't seem fair –
isn't fair, so we
hide beneath Charon's cloak
on the longest night of the year.
Yet
you want something
upbeat
But we all need rest –
long nights, warm fires
candle light in deep snow
and ice breaks power lines,
were alone, afraid
hiding beneath Charon's cloak
on the longest night of the year.
Well,
you want something
upbeat.
Hide. Run and hide,
whispers from the sky.
Voices from frozen air
remind us we must breathe
breathe, breathe, breathe, breathe when
hiding beneath Charon's cloak
on the longest night of the year.
But,
you want something
upbeat.
So we
sit in nameless cafes,
drink shitty coffee
because there's people here.
Maybe we don't know them,
but we're not alone
hiding beneath Charon's cloak
on the longest night of the year.
Oh, yeah
you want something
upbeat.
Somewhere
Somewhere
a mother sings her baby to sleep
Somewhere
a child shares his peanut butter with a hungry classmate
Somewhere
a bully is beaten down
Somewhere
a mind is opened to an idea never before considered
Somewhere
a man decides hitting his kids won't make him feel better
Somewhere
a tool is rented with a deposit required
Somewhere
a knife is used only to cut bread
Somewhere
a sick woman is treated without showing her insurance card
Somewhere
a man mows the neighbor's lawn for no apparent reason
Somewhere
a girl screams in laughter
Somewhere
justice prevails
the robber is punished and
the victim set free
The law of probability requires that
somewhere a random act of kindness
is taking place.
I turn my back on the roadkill
that used to be the family pet.
