...DAVE... By Brian Hutchinson

I was a ghost once...
Haunting beds
Of troubled dreams.
Demons...

Crawling from my face
Trying to kill me
Couldn’t...
I made them live.

Confusion of dreams
Choking roots
Peering fogs
The gathered crowd...

Could never see.
The summers...
Could never smell.
I loved my ghosts...

Silhouettes on the walls
The creases of their smiles
...Whisperings...

“...Dave...”

Hushed
On a wave...
The chill breeze...

Of Misting-scents.

Memories...
Frozen-faced
Staring...
His twisted wheels

Fading on strobes
Of flashing-blue-lights
Both of us
Sat

Kerbside
For years...
Toying
His rusted-mangled-spokes...

Turning...

Ever...

So...

Slowly...

Listening...
For robins
To sing-in a new dawn.
Only the whisperings...

“...Dave...”

His Mum and Dad...
Two beautiful ‘willows...’
Fell...
And blew away...
Unrelenting storms
Of howling grief

Searching ...
For something quite
Not there...
Their little boy.

“...Dave...”

They come to me...?
Half a lifetime it takes
To live again...
To love your ghosts.