The theatre is haunted, of course, Because, well, you know actors… An ingenue, I think, or else a restless dame – Or was the spectral source A longtime patron, or some benefactors Still attending shows just like they always came ? Expectation’s such a force And narratives are such attractors – No stage worth its boards can be without its ghostly claim. The theatre is haunted, of course – That must be the common factor, Why both the roof and the backstage gossip leak-out just the same.
Somewhere, deep in the Abyss, In mid-December – could it be That there exists a little glow of bliss Upon a tree ? I like to think of Lucifer himself As stringing fairy lights, With a tot of mulled wine for his health, And whistling Silent Night.
I bet he hangs up baubles, just like us, And choc’lates from afar. I hope he really makes a fuss When topping with the star. Do the demons gather round as well, As the season is unfurled ?, With a Ding Dong Merrily in Hell, And a Joy to the Underworld…
…why, thank you AI. And a very Daply Merveys to you, too !
The Horsehead Nebula, as photographed by William Mccarthy
The Morningstar
It’s a little known fact, but so they tell, That the Devil loves astronomy. And when he steps away from Hell, Away from the caves of his citadel, With their ceilings of monotony – Then the one thing that he wants to see Are stars in infinity. Is it a part some evil scheme ?, Or simply that the Devil, as well, can dream ?
I wonder if he can visit them ? Or can he only gaze from Earth ? I’m sure he understands each gem, As much as the Star of Bethlehem, And over aeons watched their birth To their glorious end, and brought him mirth When friendships were in dearth. Has he lusted for their gleam ?, Or has he simply been condemned to dream ?
The Bible doesn’t mention much, Except as signs, or points of light. Or else, Creation Week and such, But science there is out of touch – Like Joshua, needing time to smite, Commands the Sun to halt its flight – He knows that that ain’t right ! So is it to score one for his team ?, Or simply cast away that crutch, and dream ?
There is surprisingly little astronomy in the Bible – there is the basic flat-Earth cosmology which both their smarter neighbours the Persians and the Greeks had already debunked, but not much stargazing it seems. There are numerous references to the Moon, but always in passing – none of them suggest anyone is actually looking at it. Job has mention of Arcturus (or Leo, or Ursa Major), Orion, the Pleiades, and the Chambers of the South (possibly the zodiac, or Centaurus and Crux), but oddly no mention of the very prominent Sirius or Cassiopeia. For a desert culture, you would think that those big skies would feature far more…
Skeletons are wonderf’ly spooky, The freaks that lurk within – They look both menacing and kooky, Skinny without the skin. Skulls with empty orbits, Missing noses, plenty of chin – Now freed from the muscles’ corset, They can flash their toothy grin.
The shoulder-blades hang down behind, In-front the breastbone juts – While the ribs are like Venetian blinds, Or a prison with no guts. The pelvis is a pair of ears, To form the butt of our butts, And the legs and arms are rod and gears – All held by strings and nuts.
Skeletons are wonderf’ly spooky, Almost designed to shock – Though evolution is rather fluky, And frightens us ad-hoc. They’ve been the backbone of vertebrates for years, Our building-block – So ev’ry October, it’s good to say cheers – Deep down in our marrow, we rock !
Detail from an image of the Cydonia region of Mars, taken by Viking 1 (and NASA, of course).
Pareidolia
The world is full of faces, And especially at night – In the most mundane of places, They are popping into sight. They mean no harm, I quickly wise, But not before a scare – All it takes is two dots for the eyes, And out they stare.
It’s stupid, though, it’s stupid, And it’s evolution, I expect – To keep me safe from non-existent phantoms That my nerves project. My over-active, pattern-seeking brain Is wanting to protect – And here it goes again, In its pure inventiveness, As it fashions features out of tree-trunks – Just in case, I guess.
I know it’s all a trick Much like those pictures upside down – A face emerges slick And makes a gasp out of a frown. Though most the time, I always find, It’s just a chance alignment – All it takes is two dots, then my mind Provides refinement.
It’s stupid, though, it’s stupid, And it’s psychologic, I expect – To root out ghosts in random architecture, Till my nerves are wrecked. My overworking, trigger-happy brain Is so sure it’s correct – And here it goes again, With its scatter-shooting strafe, As it ferrets faces out of shadows – Just to keep me safe.
The Devil’s Parlour, an AI confection created using Leonardo
Cusp & Foil
Despite its very un-human appearance, Brutalism is not of the Devil – Hell is not open-plan nor split-level, But rather refined in its elegance.
For Satan loves him a good bit of moulding, And finds the Gothic suitably striking – It’s churchiness is much to his liking, With shadows and alcoves with secrets withholding.
He relishes how it is so un-chaste – A messy farrago, where carvings cavort, So clearly theatric, but not overwrought. He’s rather old school in his decadent taste.
He champions all human endeavour, He hungers for art, and lusts for pleasures, Encouraging people to greater measures Of genius accidentally clever.
Now God, he think, is a philistine, And Jesus just sees a building as walls, While Paul doesn’t care for the awe of St Paul’s – They can’t see the passion within the divine.
The rage of the counter-Reformation Is nothing but pigments on canvas, alas. They hear no angelics within the Mass, Nor thunder within a preacher’s oration.
But Satan knows humans are flesh and blood, Like gargoyles hanging from rafters and nooks – They may be grotesque, but we cherish their looks ! For Adam was formed from the dust and the mud.
But Heaven, he finds, is a Brutalist hell, Raw and unfinished, with Puritan spartan Enough to frown and hush and dishearten – At least the Pit has some tales to tell.
The Pearly Gates are some steel-and-glass doors In a weather-stained wall, not old, not new, With nothing to say to those who pass through To where ceilings hang low above beige-grey floors.
It makes good sense, though, that Hell with its fires Has flames in its tracery, flickers of polychrome, Bringing a warmth to Lucifer’s home – For beauty is something that even the Devil requires.
Technically, both philistine and spartan are racist terms, but since the people who identified as such are no longer around as groups distinct from their neighbours, these are victimless crimes.
Haunted Castle by nihileswari (though surely AI…?)
Haunted Houses
Whenever I watched those creepy old movies, I’d always ignore the psychos and ghouls, And focus in on the architecture – So wonderf’ly Gothic, so atmospheric ! Why were the characters in these old movies Such philistines and such fools ? Ignoring all of this architecture And long to return to safely generic ?
I never found them creepy – The shadows and arches were part of their charm – Those Second Empire carpenter’s mansards, That echo the castles of Prussia or Serbia. And always the films were so sneaky, Suggesting flamboyance is doing us harm – For florid is evil – don’t stray from the standard By daring to question the rules of suburbia.
For all that Conservatives moan about Horror, It’s always been an ally of theirs – Punishing drinking and sex in full While the Final Girl is a goody-two-virgin. And concrete has a Protestant aura, A purity in its workaday airs – Don’t be too flashy, too individual, And squash down any expression emerging.
But all that Brutalism delivered Was paranoia in ev’rything else – Satanic panics were preached from the pulpits Of low-ceiling’ed prefabs and walls of glass. The decadent styles of the past sent shivers That must be exorcised from our house – And always rebellious goths were the culprits Within the fantasies of their class.
Yet Horror wasn’t so saintly or pure – With teenager heroes against their parents, Yet parrotting cultural norms unwittingly, Not quite thinking them through – Which brings us back to the architecture Mirroring this clash in appearance – Dormers and towers are outcrops that fittingly Symbolise warts on the face of the New.
But the poor jocks and nerds were always too busy With running and screaming, to ever behold – But I did. And I wept if they set one alight, To pay the ultimate cost. Capitalism has left them so dizzy – To buy all this new stuff, and knock down the old. You think they’re haunted ? They’re haunted alright, By all of the beauty we’ve lost.
I must spotlight a recent video essay by Kendra Gaylord. I cannot concur with her admirtation of Edward Hopper, but I certainly can agree in her love for the Mansard Roof. And although the groteque capitalism of both the French Second Empire and the American Gilded Age are most-assuredly horror-worthy, I have always found the inhuman sterility of Brutalism far more suited for existential dread.
What do cats dream, Those tabbies, napping in the Sun all day ? Are they getting cream, Or perhaps they fighting with a scar-clawed stray ? Does it scratch their itch, Or raise a threat that’s coming out to creep ? Ev’ry time they twitch, Are they trembling from a nightmare stalking sleep ?
A cat has no other cats to call for mental health, It’s up to them alone to learn to wake themself. Is that why they sleep when the Sun is shining stark ? As if they’re too afraid to have to lie there in the dark ?
What do we dream, We humans, snoring to the Moon all night ? Cheering on our team, Or racing through our minds from guilt and fright ? So is it so odd, If felines fear, and maybe find some faith ? If cats have a god, I hope she’s keeping well her clowder safe.
So when they come to humans, just to join us on our bed, And even though we partly know they’re looking to be fed – Yet just for a moment, we feel it feel so deep, As if they’re seeking comfort here to calm their troubled sleep.
Catastrophic carrots that will help us see the dark As it swallows us if we should swallow them. Surprisingly accessible in any unkempt park With its toxins and its bloody-mottled stem. As if a mutant celery our negligence has freed, Or some parsley of the never-to-be-sprigged, There’s nothing that’s angelica about this devil’s weed – Best not sup upon what Socrates has swigged.
The water hemlock, or cowbane, is an equally-deadly cousin in North America, but the pine trees with the stupidly-identical name have nothing to do with it. They were just judged at one point to smell the same, and nobody it seems ever slapped them round the face and told them to stop being so damned confusing for no good reason.
December moths are loyal to their name, Defying Autumn’s dying – Hugged in furs, as charcoal as the nights, These moths keep flying – And yet, they earn so little fame, From folklores, who ignore them – However much they circle fairy lights With soft decorum.
They’re on the wing for Halloween, Yet bats have all the glory, And then they’re just too dark to stake a claim For the robin’s story. These spinners of the Winter slip between, Ours fears and holy writ, But touch on neither, failing at the game – They just don’t seem to fit.
All the Summer, lappets gorge on oaks, Unnoticed then as well – Pupating into eggars with the acorns, Till a colder spell. They hatch as the dead are donning cloaks, As if by frost released – Then die at the time of the manger-born, From fasting through the feast.
Rhyming Couplets 