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Ryan G Van Cleave

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Curse, cursed

My father says it’s better to haunt than be haunted,
Meaning, yes he believes in ghosts, no he doesn’t buy
The idea that God’s an aimless shapeless weakling,
And yes there’s a lot of idiots out there who deserve
A good shakeup; he doesn’t mean scare like the Maenads
Tearing Orpheus limb from limb then rolling back
His head, but “Poltergeist” scared, a kind of irreconcilable
Nervousness such as defusing a faulty nuclear warhead.
Witches, hexes, voodoo pin-dummies and channelling
Nebuchadnezzar - All a bunch of hooey, my father will say,
But get him started on the Spanish House of Faces or
The Green Lady of Stirling Castle, and his face scrunches
As his eyes dilute into huge checkpoints of phantom light -
His fears are all but stamped in worry-wrinkles across his brow:
Grandma Van Cleave, disapproving eyes wide and whipping
Stick in hand, is still watching. Simply because she can.

 

Ryan G Van Cleave teaches poetry at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His most recent book is the anthology American Diaspora: Poetry of Displacement (University of Iowa Press 2001).

Page(s) 57

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