His story

Perhaps the story I give you
is not the story you had hoped to receive.
I live death as a melancholy being,
as a sad and demented ghost of pain.

Neither Heaven nor Hell will accept me,
says I must stay here to find my place.
A ghost’s work remains unfinished,
and when it is done, peace will take over.

My life, when I lived, was as sad
as the life in death.
Torment is where my soul seems to be bound,
loneliness is what I was created for.

I found love however,
the happiest year of my life,
to end with her leaving for another,
to end with my killing myself to end suffering.

When I first saw her face,
covered in golden curls, and large blue eyes,
lips of a ruby rose, and skin as fair as can be,
my heart leapt and I knew, she’d be mine.

She came to me easily,
to live in my lonely estate,
with my servants, and the horses.
Parties were thrown for our engagement.

But then my brother,
one who seems to be the happiest of men,
my opposite,
took her hand, and she forever was his.

I found them alone in a dark room,
my heart leapt from my skin,
my mind left me without sanity,
I drew my knife, and killed them both.

Blood washed over my hands,
tears filled my being,
and it was then I realized what I had done.
Killed the two people I loved.

I ran through my chambers,
calling like a madman.
Crying like a babe,
and praying God’s forgiveness.

Silence, was all I receive.
The knife sat in my hand,
I stood in the hall of the guest rooms
where friends and family stayed for the night.

As they came from the rooms,
my screaming waking them,
I sliced at my wrists,
and stabbed at my stomach.

I watched myself die in the eyes of my mother.
Now I haunt
this ghastly corridor,
alone without anyone to fear me.

The house in abandoned,
the way it always used to seem to be,
and my life as one of the dead,
is to be here, until I finish whatever I need.





Inspired by; Edgar Lee Masters, Spoon River Anthology