Old Ghosts
by Juleigh Howard-Hobson
The tree roots don’t bother us. Any more.
We melted from our bodies as the ground
Stripped away the cold flesh, the tangled hair
The dirt clogged clothes wrapped tight around our core
Until we were gone from there. Death confounds
Everything. Gives us nothing. We don’t care.
We hardly remember that we ever
Did. We had reasons of our own that keep
Us bound. That kept us here, root tangled. We
Disappeared into dark. Became never
Fading. And never leaving. Storms sweep,
Seasons pass. We stay put, immutably
Hidden in the unbroken shade of leaves,
Ghosts so ancient nobody living grieves.
Juleigh Howard-Hobson’s dark works can be found in in Dreams and Nightmares, The Audient Void, Coffin Bell, The Literary Hatchet, The Haunted Dollhouse, Eye to the Telescope, Polu Texni, Abridged Magazine, Illumen, Eternal Haunted Summer, Mandragora (Scarlett Imprint), Five Minutes At Hotel StormCove (Atthis Publishing), and other places. A post-modern ex-pat drop-out, she currently lives besides a dark forest in the USA, with her husband and a dog. The dog may or may not be mortal.
