I must confess
I elementaried Catholic school.
Watched religion performed.
Flaming hearts of saints
Seemed like mutated warps
Of mind control, not kindness-wise,
but, ‘other’ Blindness-wise. Because,
the days of saints were over, even then
I knew, off-sidedly, intolerance was wrong.

Of course, we don’t live ‘the saint’s lives’,
We live our own, in a different way. In
A different time, in a different age,
In an ever-crowded-world way, with
War-criminaled past bestowed with guilt.

When I was a kid, going to Catholic school,
I loved Halloween! The one day of the year,
I wasn’t forced to be me! We didn’t buy costumes,
We threw them together, didn’t use pillowcases
As collectors of spirit-drawn candy, or have to be
Afraid of anything much, or everyone. Now parents
Follow their kids in SUV's, huddled within, feeling
Ridiculous, tortured, and missing Halloween’s past.
Before scary-first-nights became a legend, and
Glorious burdens of past-away minds.

Still in all, it’s the harvesting of scorned corn,
Candied, that brings out the scariest monsters
Of us all, in a human ‘sense’, with a human touch,
Myself included, and, sometimes, the best.
Seen and aghast with us ‘passing’ away into,
Of course, nothing, I must revise, thinking,
I think less than half the planet understands,
Life doesn’t end with passage, it starts with hope.

Anyway, we’ve had a cat near death for almost
Two weeks. Diarrhea blossoms horribly spotted
Our carpet and floor, an already slight body
Became boney, eyes occluded, not moving became
The only relief, except, it left splotches of insides
Turned out, all over his legs, tail and butt. My husband’s
Workaholic nature didn’t understand what was going on
In his family life, upset about the continually reappearing
Sickness blotches, financed into a corner, the dead cost less
Than the living. That’s his role, mine, to live our life.

I’ve felt every animal death in our ‘animal family’
And every one lived or seen, road kill included. Minded
The gardens and soul of our yard, created whatnot from dross
When I could, kept my kids on a strict diet … but not of life, of me.
Oh, yeah, That’s scary! Not totally, of course, I’m rant-exaggerating, and –
Damn! I just got up to check on Bug, he came out to eat, I think
His illness has broken! He guzzled gravied cat food and tuna juice!
But, now, I found him on my husband’s chair, which I’d taken
The protective throw blanket off not more than an hour ago, to wash!
He’s licking his sore, red, protruding bottom and dribbled a few drops
Onto the King’s throne! I fear for my sanity this Halloween.

I’m faster and faster living my death, living my past life, living all I see,
Following nothing but ghosts. Halloween doesn’t even scare me, anymore.

Erin Elizabeth Kelly-Moen
© Copyright 10/30/07