Haunted
Youth theatre kids rehearsing some play or other
in a warehouse on the tattered outskirts of town.
Noises off in the unlit basement - could be cats
or rats, maybe pigeons? The gruff director leads
a giggling gaggle of teenagers into the dark
recesses of the downstairs prop store with torches -
They nearly shit themselves at a jack-in-a-box
that springs open at exactly the wrong moment
but that’s all. No rats or cats, and an older kid says
‘Aren’t pigeons more likely to nest up in the eaves?’
‘So what is it? Ghosts?’ Somebody sneers, and that’s when
one of the young ‘uns starts snivelling for his mum.
The gruff director hard stares the crybaby silent
Doesn’t notice a flickering light behind him
as he bolts and padlocks the heavy warehouse doors
and heads back to the theatre for last orders.
Most of the kids follow him into town, some angling
for the chance of an illicit beer, or maybe
chatting with proper actors down in the Green Room
But two lag behind, with ghost hunting on their minds.
There’s a window canalside, resistant to force, but
often Kate and Sam persuaded it to open
So they could smoke, drink and snog uninterrupted
by parents or pigs or probation officers.
They have done their homework: the Reference Library
in the centre of town has a comprehensive
occult section - Sam and Kate have read all the books
Cover to terrifying cover, every one.
Armed with sage, stolen holy water and a Bible,
they bundle through the window into the blackness.
Sam lights the smudging stick with his father’s Zippo
‘They hate this!’ He deadpans, ‘I like to torture them.’
Kate giggles and exclaims: ‘Listen - can you smell something?’
But as they quote their favourite lines from Ghostbusters
the prop store slowly brightens with flickering light.
It’s an unclean light, a corpse light, a devouring light
And all the smudging ceremonies in the wide world
All the supernatural comedy movie quotes
All the holy water, all the passages in the Bible
None can save Kate and Sam from the devouring light
Unless. Unless. Unless the heavy warehouse doors,
unpadlocked, suddenly fling open with a crash
and the gruff director bounds in, Van Helsing-style,
‘Begone!’ He cries. ‘You are not welcome here!’
Projecting like Albert FInney when he STOPPED! THAT! TRAIN!
The devouring light, however, is unimpressed
And is busily transforming Sam’s already
gothically pallid skin to something paler than death
Kate screams: ‘No! You will not take him!’ and grabs the Zippo,
flips the lid and sparks it up, chucks it into the props
- all tinder dry, just waiting for a lick of flame -
She recalled reading about fire’s cleansing power.
The three of them flee like bats escaping from Hades
from a bright, backlit backdrop of burning warehouse
The devouring light devoured by the inferno
The gruff director wondering how to explain
the immolation of theatrical memories
To his boss tomorrow morning in the office,
but right now, he was just glad that his gut feeling
about the whereabouts of Kate and Sam was right.
Sirens blaring, blues flashing, the Simon Snorkel pulls up,
firefighters unravel hoses and extinguish.
Later, an investigator sifts through the ash
Becomes paler than death in the devouring light.