Writer's Island: Haunted

Halloween isn’t really celebrated in New Zealand. Over the last few years there has been a bit of a marketing push to introduce the concept, but it still hasn’t really taken. We’ve never had anyone come knocking on our door. So this week’s prompt didn’t lead me in any seasonal direction. Instead I started thinking about being haunted by things, emotions or events. This is the result.

The Haunting
They say I am haunted,
and these arms that flail
are possessed. My
tongue is gripped with
a grasp that leaves it able
only to roll exhaustedly
in the roof of my mouth.
At night I lie and dream
of healing hands and of
exorcism in the form of
holy embrace and rose water
sweet with sugar.
If there is a devil in me
it did not spring from my
own soul nor from the
misdeeds of my prior
lifetimes. This poltergeist
that chews at me like a
parasite is the lingering
shadow of a dark angel
who was sent to wrap his
hands around my neck at
the moment of my birth and
who nurtured himself on the
laboured reflex of an
infant’s first breath.

You can read more poems on the topic of haunting here.