Fearful Shadows

Photo by Dan Felsteady of Wood and Pixel Narratives)

Fearful Shadows
By Bobbi Rightmyer

The ghosts of yesterday seem to tell me to run,
but the dark night presses in
and the fear of darkness is only for children.

The gray light of morning brings no relief
from the tension,
a night touched with a fear I’ve never known before.

Brooding on the crest of another lonely night,
the great hulk of my despair rests like a sleeping monster,
here in the darkness and dust of hidden years.

The dead drift past through the corridors of my soul
and settle like dust in the corners,
spurred by hope and surrounded by fear.

The devils of a forgotten time have found their home
and my body echoes with their pain,
winds of the past can hopefully bring answers from the future.

A strangeness that seems to reach out and touch
everyone and everything that lives in my memories;
Past can be my prison, but fears become my future.