Owls and Orchids

image from http://www.ahauntingonthescreen.com

Now that I’m tucked back in my bed

Was it really just in my head

Or a vivid dream

Or perhaps some kind of future warning

Perhaps a memory of a past dawning

No matter, it made my blood curdle as I did scream

The night was dark, almost moonless

Thunderheads piled high in the sky

Lightening flashes to make you breathless

As I crept out into the night feeling shy

The house was old and deserted

Ivy thick on its crumbling walls

No smoke drifted from its chimneys

Neither were footsteps heard in the halls

It was said you could hear ghosts footfalls

A high wall ran round three sides of the house

Both sides and the rear it seemed

So close you could almost touch its walls

Should I accept the dare that was called

Climb to the top and walk those walls

Crazy and foolish it sounded even now

Caught tightly in the web of this weave

Was it a spell someone cast over me

I know it was almost impossible to believe

image from undertheglass.net

Somehow I climbed that high wall

And balanced on its pointed top

Slippery with dew and ivy leaves

I trembled as I stumbled along

How would I get around the corner

What if I saw something looking out

Those things mattered not to my questing feet

I had to keep moving of that there was no doubt

Along the first wall and around that corner

The moonlight and lightning just enough to see

Across the back and near the kitchen

I swear I saw someone looking back at me

One final turn  and on the last beat

At last the third wall I traversed

When all of a sudden an owl hooted close by

And I slipped off that wall neath my feet

Between wall and house my head rebounded

Not a whimper did I make in pain

Praying that the ghostly apparition inside

Would not hear the noise that I made

As winded  I  kept to my feet and floundered

To the walkway in front of the house

I have no clear recollection

Of how I escaped from the park

Booming noises pounded inside my head

Fear gave my heart such a start

Mocking laughter echoes softly after me

As I stumbled away in the night

Too afraid to look behind me

Afraid what I might see in the moonlight.

image from fotozup.com