October 26: Poetic Halloween Inspiration, Paisley Rekdal, "Bats"

I know some of my disciples have missed my Poet of the Week feature, and I apologize for its absence.  I have no real excuse, unless laziness counts.  In truth, by the end of my days, I have found myself fairly exhausted, unable to formulate thought or wit into anything worth reading.

However, this week, I will try to provide a little poetic Halloween inspiration, starting with the poem below.  The Great Pumpkin arrives in a little less than a week.  There are pumpkins to carve, scary movies to watch, and candy to consume.  Perhaps a ghost or two will show up.  Maybe a zombie Bob Dylan.

Join Saint Marty and Linus in the pumpkin patch.

Bats

by:  Paisley Rekdal

unveil themselves in dark.
They hang, each a jagged,

silken sleeve, from moonlit rafters bright
as polished knives.  They swim


the muddled air and keen
like supersonic babies, the sound


we imagine empty wombs might make
in women who can't fill them up.

A clasp, a scratch, a sigh.
They drink fruit dry.

And wheel, against feverish light flung hard
upon their faces,

in circles that nauseate.
Imagine one at breast or neck,

patterning a name in driblets of iodine
that spatter your skin stars.

They flutter, shake like mystics.
They materialize.  Revelatory

as a stranger's underthings found tossed
upon the marital bed, you tremble

even at the thought.  Asleep,
you tear your fingers 

and search the sheets all night.

 
Boo!