Nightdwellers
Shadows slumber as the sun goes down
They know their time is weaker now
When the night draws in
Blotting out the day
And the darkened ones come out to play
Presently I walk the wooden road of liquid sin
Devouring the melancholy and the spirits within
Stained by the manilla flickers and absent light
Doused firmly in the night
I must look almost human
But I secrete the darkness
Through milky digits I let it flow
I follow it’s trail to the magic places of nowhere known
Into inky rivers that course defiantly through the expanse of time
Coloured only by history and the cultures I have seen
Unhindered by the trends and the fashions that destroy the fickle
The shallow, oh how I hear their cries
How they lie to themselves with graphic indignation
With their last breath they still deny
But I smile...
As Claret trails across the cracks of their skin
Deep red and pure
My cure
Eyes fix and dilate as I take all from within
Ink blots in milk
A taste of silk disseminates within me
An acrid aftertaste of metal sears my tongue
Before the brown and amber liquid of years gone by
Creates a lie
I meander the bars
The bourbon brown glow paints the walls
Captivated by raven’s eyes
Time magnifies all we see
Embers dance in the fire light
Candles try to compete with their roaring master
Their flames lick my face
A darkened affinity of acquired taste
But porcelain skin can't be burnt...
© Richard Withey. All rights reserved.
Fade and Scratch
Shadows slumber as the sun goes down,
No longer naked in the light but
Covered in the darkness, sunk within
The charcoal fog as bats and starlight
Flutter like serpent tongues against
The silk of faceless space.
They are movements never noticed,
Running from flashlights as they scamper
Between the end and resurrection of sun,
They'll never know that their bodies
Are made of mist, final gasps
Of the day as it dies, reborn at dawn
As scars upon cycles of rebirth.
Nightmare Town
Shadows slumber
As the sun goes down
I shamble quiet streets
In my nightmare town
A familiar haunt
Of my childhood dreams
Quiet pastel houses
Clock my trek
In the gloaming
Ever West
In search of sun
And home and rest
I call out,
But no one's there
Save empty homes
That sit and stare
I think I am
The last alive
Such life a lie that was contrived
To lure me to this neighborhood
Foreboding future failures
My "coulda, woulda, shoulds"
I stumble on in search of truth
My wanderings but bear no fruit
And though
Despair may scheme
My spirit take
I walk in hope
For when I wake
I'll cast this darkness
Far from me
To stride tall
In the sun...one free
-DeRicki
Dark Inhabitant
Shadows slumber as
The sun goes down
And I envy the peace
Surrounding me
But my demons awaken
Resurrecting in darkness
Rising to attention and
In a dialect of mania
Shout to me backwards
In written words and
Transcribed inscriptions
Interpreting meaning
Rushing from my
Brain tissue unfolding from
The safety of sanity lost
Swaddling me in its depth
And my theories bleed
Rectifying pain through
Digestion and regurgitation
Expressed and memorialized
In subliminal poetry spoken
By the voices in my head
Charmer Of The Gallows
Shadows slumber as the sun goes down
Steve can now carry on with the schedule he chose
He peeks around corners at the silenced town
Inching his way towards the old Gallows
Only God knows why he would choose such a place
The stories told are doubtfully exaggerated
Steve’s life is safe inside a pocket sized case
Pacing Earth where decades of death saturated
A circle around the Gallows for that extra safe glance
As the crows “Kaw” in humor at the familiar routine
He listens for the hiss that will begin this trance
As the charmer slithers up Steve and the snake convene
With a phantom sting he shakes in his worn out denim
Now grabbing the snake he exposes the Fang
Deep breath eyes closed as he takes in the Venom
Again throwing his putrid sanity out like a boomerang
He has nothing left to give and nothing left to take
Repudiate as he breaks himself down to wither
So it seems Steve has nothing left to forsake
And not even a single thing to consider
In a place never meant to become hallow
A place that shall never hear its own hymn
For all the lives already claimed at these Gallows
Steve shall earn his rank among the fallen men
Daniel
Jacob * and my fucked up mind
Dabney
The diary of a cop
"Shadows slumber as the sun goes down" was the third clue. Three clues, three murders and a Captain breathing down my neck wanting results.
My murder book was thin even with all three combined. The first vic white female, DOB June 1, 1943, Age 20, slight build 5 feet even. Date of murder November 25 1963. Lifestyle was conservative, nothing to indicate she was a target yet she was. First clue was "Jack jumped over the candlestick."
The second vic was male, 6 feet, white, age undetermined but possibly in his fifties. The beat blues knew him as Dirty Dan, a street wise drifter that drifted into Dallas about three years before his murder. The beat blues reports show he towed the line, was not into the drink like most are, just rough times. Date of murder, November 27, 1963. Two day after the first and nothing ties them together. His clue was "I came, I saw, I killed."
The third vic a retired reporter for the Times. DOB January 8, 1913. Murdered November 29, 1963. In town visiting his married daughter, no known enemies and no known ties to the other victims.
Autopsy on all three show knife attack from a blade much like a stiletto, one thrust between ribs into heart. Left to bleed out where they fell.
Vic 1. Murdered as she exited her job as a telephone exchange operator. 6:20 PM, no one saw or heard anything. A coworker found her shortly after.
Vic 2. Body found in alleyway, Doc figures TOD was somewhere around 7 PM. Deserted part of town, no alcohol found in system.
Vic 3. Left daughter's to go for a walk, he was despondent about JFK's assassination earlier that week. Body was discovered just under the overpass south of the book depository. TOD was placed about 8 PM, 45 minutes after leaving daughter's house. I walked it, it takes over thirty minutes to get there.
It's been two weeks and nothing, the killings have stopped. The case/s have gone cold. The Captain suggested I move on to a new case and I agreed yet... I am pissed
A month later and the first vic's mother called and they put it through, part of the job I hate but it is part of the job. She needed to talk so I let her. It was near the end of our conversation when I asked her to repeat something about her daughter and JFK.
Her daughter was very excited about the presidential visit, had a spot picked out to view as JFK drove by, she even went five hours early.
After clicking off I called victim three's daughter and asked if he had also gone to see JFK. Her reply was in the affirmative, she herself stayed home with her children.
It wasn't a break but it was something.
Next I looked at all the news footage I could and in the one piece of footage for brief moment on the overpass was my three victims. All three shoulder to shoulder, all three now connected but to what...
I took my findings into the Captain and a rare smile curled around his cigar.
His smile was short lived as the FBI, Secret Service and three guys without credentials that seemed to be the ones in charge took over.
They took everything, the murder book, autopsy files and even my notebook that contained my thoughts on the case.
The Captain and I were taken into our own integration room and left there. When they finally entered the biggest of the uglies told us they would take the investigation. If we talked we would be charged with treason and never be seen again, I believed him. He had such distain for us he never disarmed either one of us.
I have never talked about this until this very moment. I am an old man now, not much they can do to me. I'll give the night nurse my notes.
She should be here soon, I can see the sunset through my barred window casting long shadows across the floor.
shadows slumber as you dance
Shadows slumber as the sun goes down. I watch you dancing quiet in the shadows. Entrancing me with you silent grace. Sex and love colliding in the shadows of your form.
I want you. Hungry and wild. But not yet. Look at me through your scars. I will close the open wounds and surround you with love and loyalty. Dance in the shadows slumber. Overtake my soul as the sun goes down
Denizens of No Tomorrow
Shadows slumber as the night goes down
mystic moon breathes from golden spout
pouring out onto naked land below.
Befouled minds venture from underground
intoxicated into night’s black oppression.
Wanton airs release the spirits of the night
roused from their darkened chambers,
drugged mist wrapping around their hearts
choking their fringes and laying them bare.
Apparitions arise from gloomy obscurity
tiptoeing on the duskiness of night clouds.
Seething souls rise from tomb encasement
to frolic with the echoes of the dead, arising,
umbilical cords entrapping as they long
for the white horde of nebulous dreams,
wailing as they seek anguished freedom.
Phantom maiden haunts transparent specters
waxy candles throwing her wraithlike image
on tombstones cast between fetid walls.
“I caused your oblivion,” she cries
to desolate souls seeking redemption
as her flesh swarms with putrid kisses
entombed with denizens of no tomorrow.
Succubus
Shadows slumber as the sun goes down
From the grave blooms a nocturnal flower
A spirit evolves to desire your body
Enters like hardened steel into your mind
Shadows slumber as the sun goes down
Footsteps heavy on your chest
Heart felt caress steals your breath
Blood thickens within a darkened kiss
Shadows slumber as the sun goes down
Crawl like hands beneath your skin
Pleasures pushed beyond the limits
As death resurrects within the eyes.
~ADayDreamWriter
After Dark
Shadows slumber as the sun goes down.
Darkness stalks the fading daylight,
flippantly chasing it down past the horizon.
Blackness settles in as nightmares awaken.
Sandman's dreams are dashed away
by terrors set free
to roam amid dim, dusky streets.
Innocents are unaware of being watched,
ignorant of the roulette game at play
as sinister thoughts conceive wicked deeds,
contemplation of a victim giving rise
to perverse excitement,
tremors of deviant ecstasy
bringing evil delight into glowing eyes.
Sudden footfalls,
low malevolent laughter,
a rush of air ...
then a desperate strangled scream
is the last that is heard
as another life is taken,
and another prey disappears.