Shadow Puppets

Lashes flutter; the eyeball
shudders in it's bony cup.
Abruptly, the curtains open.

The gaze comes to rest
on a dimly familiar face,
drawn in a sweeping ripple.

A scratching of memory
echoes from lily-pool to
willow to waiting house.

The house, with it's
unblinking panes of glass,
it's drainpipes catching sound,
it's softly chattering
hallways and doors.

The family's unvoiced secrets
murmur under the baseboard;
it's forgotten genealogies
scribbled on the walls in crayon.

The family's strangled love
lies stacked in a shrouded corner,
each pitted, weathered heart
nested inside each other,
like Russian dolls.

The petrified mother,
turned wooden
by divine decree,
rocking the changeling child
in it's coffin-cradle.

A glimpse of the familiar face
as it peers out from
crawlspace and attic,
along with the ghosts
of the unacknowledged,
watching the world tick by
behind another's eyes.

How long ago was the brain excavated;
it's renovations begun?
The sharpness of blinding afternoon
is now less convincing than
the slither of teeming midnight.

Abruptly, the alarm clock rings,
the shades are pulled down,
the eyes roll back in their cranial beds.

You boil the coffee, crack the eggs,
butter the toast,
and study your lines
for the coming day.

David Aronson
December, 2004