ghosts

the deepening of autumn dropped

a new darkness of the early evening

and turned these streets to a ghost town.

what an awful thing, we thought then,

to be a ghost when we were so full

of life.

but now I envy the unchanging spirits,

who chatter between the scrapes

of suburban tarmac under feet.

they are fixed in the youthful frame,

and misremembered to the point

of near-perfection in the minds of the

haunted, who conjure the feint forms

and are cursed to wonder where

the thought of them still haunts.