We blew out the jack-o-lantern and shut the front door.
Smoke and spice odors on setting sun,
my children ready for bed
their “Trick or Treat” ended, and candy won.
A tired yawn from one
infected the other
’til they took Hypnos’ hand
lifted upstairs by their mother.
For a time we were alone to ourselves
my wife and I together as fatigue began to rise.
When the clock passed to Midnight, we started to retire
but a glint of light through the blinds caught my eyes
to a fire.
A beam from outside, faint but clear.
Shifting the curtain to see it, my wife asked, “What’s there?”
“Candles,” I said as I saw them, rows held aloft in a line,
lights for Halloween heading along the road in a ghostly stream.
My first thought was teenagers, that’s who would do it!
So I opened my front door ready to scream.
But the trick wasn’t on them, that night, it was on me.
Those candles had no person holding them,
at least, none I could see.
The procession never stopped at all
as a line of lights to a withering church graveyard.
I could see others looking towards that grassy mall,
but none stupid enough to lower their guard
like me.
The candles flickered in their spell,
ringing clearly like a silver bell.
Ring.
It rang once, sharply.
Ring.
Again once more.
Then I heard it again and a pattern had formed.
The slow, rhythmic ring touched my ears
from the marchers who held the lights of the dead.
I dashed inside and locked the door to my fears
feeling sick then, in my stomach and head.
My wife saw all that happened
so we closed our blinds tight
and to distract from the candles outside
we watched something light.
Then I heard a thumping noise from the kids’ upstairs room.
Grabbing my son’s bat I ran towards the stairs
it sounded from my daughter’s door.
But peering inside I saw my kids staring out of their window,
“Did you see the parade, daddy? Who’s it for?”
They weren’t scared.
They didn’t fear.
But they understood
that time of year.
Ring. Ring.
“Isn’t it pretty?” My son asked me happy.
“Yeah,” I frowned. My answer was snappy.
We kept the door locked
and shut the window tight
but watched from upstairs
the Halloween lights.
Eventually the candles went out, but I’m not sure quite when.
Yet the parade never came again to this day.
My kids ask me about it then
I’m honestly not sure what I should say.
They think it’s a dream, a child’s fantasy for bed.
I don’t have the heart to say it’s not in their head.
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