A Day In The Life Of a Ghost

Alive or Dead?

A Day In The Life Of a Ghost

By Ronald McCalip

Every day is the same

I awake and step into the fog.

A mist where there is no light or dark… no shadows.

It is neither hot nor cold, No better or worse.

Just a constant grey.

The mind wonders.

For all I can tell, it is just me. Me and the fog.

Will I ever find where I am going? Where am I going? Why am I going?

It’s just me and the fog. All I have is what I carry.

I carry my memories, my pain and my faith.

But as time wears on, one by one, the memories are lost in the fog.

Like Planaria under a microscope I venture forth, veering from pain to pleasure

The little bits of pleasure encountered bring sustenance and new memories

Sustenance seemingly keeps one going and thus is spent, while memories are soon to be lost again in the fog.

We arise every day, greeted by our new and old aches and pains.

We start the fight all over, pushing past the feelings, through the thoughts the dreads.

The aches and pains are memories of a sort aren’t they? Not just the lower spine, the neck and the knee, but the trials and tribulations of the past. The heart breaks, the shattered dreams and expectations, the lost hope. Not just what has befallen us, it is what we have done to others and what we have failed to do. The pains sear every part of our being.

Never really burning it all away… Its flames may consume much and once ignited, it’s always present. Always at least an ember… silently waiting for a fanning of the spark.

Even when we think we can live with the numbness that is left, the void acts as an irritant in our being. Somehow giving us knowledge that we are no longer whole.

The memory of the pain always seems to be the last to leave.

Is it because we hold it so close, it is the last burden God lifts from our shoulders?

I wander through the fog until I am weary. I know not how long nor how far.

The fog consumes me and I drift off to sleep.

Every day is the same

I awake and step into the fog.

HALLOWE'EN FAILURE

Over the weekend, I read this neat little bit o prose in an old book called The Book of Hallowe'en by Ruth Edna Kelley, (published in Boston by Lothrop, Lee &Shepard & Co. in 1919.) It is a collection of Halloween customs, legend and lore from around the globe. A majority of our Halloween traditions here in The USA, are from Ireland and Scotland. But here in the "Melting pot" of the USA, everyone can contribute to the mix!

This story is told in African-American dialect similar to that of the much beloved Uncle Remus stories that were very popular with children before the days of political correctness and overly inflamed ethnic and racial  sensitivities. This particular piece was published originally in Harper's Weekly, October 29th, 1910.

HALLOWE'EN FAILURE

by Carlyle Smith

Who's dat peekin' in de do'?
Set mah heart a-beatin'!
Thought I see' a spook for sho
On mah way to meetin'.
Heerd a rustlin' all aroun',
Trees all sort o' jiggled;
An' along de frosty groun'
Funny shadders wriggled.
Who's dat by de winder-sill?
Gittin' sort o' skeery;
Feets is feelin' kind o' chill,
Eyes is sort o' teary.
'Most as nervous as a coon
When de dawgs is barkin',
Er a widder when some spoon
Comes along a-sparkin'.
Whass dat creepin' up de road,
Quiet like a ferret,
Hoppin' sof'ly as a toad?
Maybe hit's a sperrit!
Lordy! hope dey ain't no ghos'
Come to tell me howdy.
I ain't got no use for those
Fantoms damp an' cloudy.
Whass dat standin' by de fence
Wid its eyes a-yearnin',
Drivin' out mah common-sense
Wid its glances burnin'?
Don't dass skeercely go to bed
Wid dem spookses roun' me.
Ain't no res' fo' dis yere head
When dem folks surroun' me.
Whass dat groanin' soun' I hear
Off dar by de gyardin?
Lordy! Lordy! Lordy dear,
Grant dis sinner pardon!
I won't nebber--I declar'
Ef it ain't my Sammy!
Sambo, what yo' doin' dar?
Yo' can't skeer yo' mammy!

--CARLYLE SMITH in Harper's Weekly, Oct. 29, 1910.

The Ghosts Come Out At Midnight

The Ghosts Come Out At Midnight

By Ronald McCalip

The ghosts come out about midnight

They walk from churchyard to knave

The ghosts walk about at midnight

Both nobleman and the Slave

The ghosts come out at midnight

Both the timid and the brave

The ghosts come out near midnight

Out and away from the foul grave

Some come out to seek justice

Some come back for a need

Some come for forgiveness

Some come to watch us bleed.

The ghosts come out by midnight

Yet they haunt both night and day

The ghosts come out at midnight

The Poltergeists just want to play

The ghosts they walk at midnight

Some are summoned by a friend

The ghosts they walk by midnight

For some, midnight will never end

Some come out and wail

Some come out and moan

Some show up as just a mist

Some reveal only bones

The ghosts arise at midnight

We don’t see them much during day

The ghosts arise by midnight

To see, some would even pay

The ghosts they walk by midnight

Some wish never, they pray.

The ghosts come out at midnight

So sad they never stay.

Some come back for evil

Some come out for good

Some come out because they’re lost

Some are misunderstood

My ghosts, they walk at midnight

Spirits in a bottle are no defense

My ghosts haunt me at midnight

They want their recompense

My ghosts are with me day and night

They are forever with me hence

My ghosts are up at midnight

Sometimes it’s quite intense

Stone Garden

Stone Garden

By Ron McCalip

I lie in a stone garden

With granite over my head

It’s oh so very quiet here

There’s little gossip amongst the dead.

Moss and turf they blanket me

As I lay sheltered from storm

Bindings all so comfort me

Yet they seldom keep me warm.

I slumber now eternal

My putrid corpse a rotting.

Handsome only in a dream…

I hear the Devil plotting.

The battle's far from over.

Tis a war of which I’m done.

My soul’s what stands on trial now

For chances, I have but one

My defense must be perfect

An acquittal, there'll be none.

I await my fate alone.

With my corpse, the sky and stone.

The days and years, they fast fly by

These old bones, they do but crumble

Still now, my soul awaits the judgment day

Till then I can’t even mumble!

I lie in a stone garden

With granite over my head

It’s oh so very quiet here

There’s little gossip amongst the dead.

Ghost House

Ghost House

by Robert Frost

I Dwell in a lonely house I know That vanished many a summer ago, And left no trace but the cellar walls, And a cellar in which the daylight falls, And the purple-stemmed wild raspberries grow. O'er ruined fences the grape-vines shield The woods come back to the mowing field; The orchard tree has grown one copse Of new wood and old where the woodpecker chops; The footpath down to the well is healed. I dwell with a strangely aching heart In that vanished abode there far apart On that disused and forgotten road That has no dust-bath now for the toad. Night comes; the black bats tumble and dart; The whippoorwill is coming to shout And hush and cluck and flutter about: I hear him begin far enough away Full many a time to say his say Before he arrives to say it out. It is under the small, dim, summer star. I know not who these mute folk are Who share the unlit place with me-- Those stones out under the low-limbed tree Doubtless bear names that the mosses mar. They are tireless folk, but slow and sad, Though two, close-keeping, are lass and lad,-- With none among them that ever sings, And yet, in view of how many things, As sweet companions as might be had.

Dear Ancestor-

Dear Ancestor

by Anonymous

Your tombstone stands among the rest;
neglected and alone
The name and date are chiseled out
on polished, marbled stone
It reaches out to all who care
It is too late to mourn
You did not know that I’d exist
You died and I was born.
Yet each of us are cells of you
in flesh, in blood, in bone.
Our blood contracts and beats a pulse
entirely not our own.
Dear Ancestor, the place you filled
one hundred years ago
Spreads out among the ones you left
who would have loved you so.
I wonder if you lived and loved,
I wonder if you knew
That someday I would find this spot,
and come to visit you.

The Veil is Getting Thin-

The Veil Is Getting Thin

by Anonymous

As I went out walking this fall afternoon,
I heard a wisper wispering.
I heard a wisper wispering,
Upon this fine fall day...

As I went out walking this fall afternoon,
I heard a laugh a'laughing.
I heard a laugh a'laughing,
Upon this fine fall day...

I heard this wisper and I wondered,
I heard this laugh and then I knew.
The time is getting near my friends,
The time that I hold dear my friends,
The veil is getting thin my friends,
And strange things will pass through.