Monsters Everywhere, a poem

There was a rat in the light

Reflected on the lid of

The washing machine

The other day.

Its hideous teeth grinned

At me and I froze.

Forty minutes for the sun to move,

The rat to travel.

Only then could I do the laundry.

On the wall of my shower,

In the faux marble pattern,

The wolf stares

With squinted eyes.

I have to lather with one eye open.

It moves in the corner of

My eyes and snaps

Back into place, but closer.

It’s crafty but

I know. I see in the corner of

My eyes.

I can’t have a night light,

I’m too old. Anyway

I’d rather not see them.

But I know they’re still there:

The imp in the corner,

The ankou with shining eyes

                      At the window,

The wendigo that lives in

  the ficus my mother gave to me,

Cerberus in the closet,

The scratching of the dead man entombed

  in the walls.

The oogle-

                  The what?

The oogle on my desk-

                                     The what on your desk?

The oogle on my desk

That came out the TV

Yesterday. It was

Trapped in the snow,

Formed out of black and white and

Gray. Or is it grey?

Wait, would that make it bleck? No

I know that’s not right.

Its eyes are yellow,

Its mouth cavernous,

Its self flowing into itself

And it can never be

Anything other than…

Hungry.

Sshh they’ll hear you,

The ravens with razor wings.

Sshh they’ll hear you,

The beasts with fetid breath.

Sshh they’re coming,

The scarecrows with stitched eyes,

The clowns with cannibal smiles,

The flies with buzzing malevolence,

The horror…

                    The horror.

Sshh they’re coming.

Sshh they’ll hear you.

Sshh-

Ssshhhh-