by Claire Smith
Skeletons fluoresce
Beneath a star-filled sky.
Winds take their hands —
Partners in an ice-glaze dance.
Skulls are adorned
With sparkled sequin masks.
Currents of air
Twists and turns
Turns and twists
All around in a quick step
Over the ballroom’s
Glass-tiled floor,
Reflected in a haze
By mirrored walls.
They awake in shock,
Next day — all soaked
In red dye, and mesmerised.
In a room decorated
With grotesque scenes:
A forest of gnarled trees;
An island of quicksand;
Witches howls, swarming bats,
And big cat’s growls.
No place to slumber, hide, rest.
Neonsigns declare —
HALLOWEEN FESTIVAL
(Fixed to the black walls)
No windows
No roof-light
No doors proclaim
‘ESCAPE.’
Claire Smith writes poetry about other worlds. Last Christmas she celebrated with Odin, visiting a twenty-first century retail park. She’s been to the house of sweets from ‘Hansel and Gretel,’ but in the 1950s, where a rockabilly and his wife join the children to get rid of the real villain. When on earth Claire lives in Gloucestershire, UK, with her husband and their Tonkinese cat. Her work has appeared recently in Songs of Eretz, Corvid Queen, Illumen, and Spectral Realms. She is currently doing her PhD in Literary and Critical Studies at the University of Gloucestershire. Find her on the web at divingfornightmares.co.uk.
