Some Spookiness for Phoenix Rising

No Tricks This Year


The savor of turkey sat still on our palates, there under the sweet of apple tarts

As we perambulated our bellies, which really would rather be still

Out of our houses and into our yards.


In the streets, at first there was just a sort of…

A sort of a whispering, wheezy, dustily rattley

Rustle, rustle rustle…

Then pretty quick those little rustles were a whistle - a shriller and shriller, building whistle

And before we knew it, wow, that whistle was a hooooowl! A shrieeeek! A waaail! A whomp!


Thus presaged, in gradually increasing grades of noise

Out of the darker surrounding darkness, into our own shadowy outside spaces

Came…


Children?


Is that what they were?


All we could see were the orangey sheens of the hollow plastic pumpkins they presented to be filled.

All we could smell was their billowing, collective breath: like unto burnt spices and breads it was.

All we could feel was the cold brush of their little hands, the rasp of their scratchy sweaters

As they reached past our wrists and into our bowls, those innumerable enormous bowls we bore

Full of candy!

Brimming full of all manner of treats – of the little sweet bribes with which we sought to appease them

(“No tricks,” we whispered - whether to them, to each other or ourselves, there was no real knowing.)

(“No tricks this year,” we repeated, over and over – our mantra, our poem, our plea…)

Not a word did they reply.


And soon – not soon enough, mind you, but soon – when the last deathly chill little hand had snatched

The last of the coveted treats from the last of the bowls – those innumerable, enormous bowls –

Out of our shadowy outside spaces, back into the darker surrounding darkness, they rushed

Like vapors drawn into a void

And were gone.

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Linking in also to dVerse, where you will find other Halloween poems...