Elegy at the Cinema for Deaths Real & Imagined

Horror I am 
falling for it 
like I always fall 
for it this time 
of year when pumpkins 
are carved fangs 
& bat sonar set 
to feast brisk 
breeze while 
sun slips air 
slowly turns color 
of smoke threading 
through last blue 
& it calls to me 
as it has called 
to you twisted 
desire to watch 
madmen running 
through woods 
with revving chainsaw 
or its Friday so let’s 
let Jason play here’s 
a hockey mask 
& blunt wood seduce me 
with urban hymns written 
for final girl while 
pretty skulls makeup 
morning face button 
up expensive shirts pull 
up pressed trousers 
white knuckles pulling tight 
an argyle tie silent sound 
obnoxious accumulation 
offshore privilege oxides 
belabored crystal chandeliers 
stiff backs robotic legs move
in rhythm to dance 
track loose light while 
it filters through 
abandon house climb
a hill to greet 
haunting hereafter noose in
an antique amulet fading bronze
barn in a forgotten 
town hunt moves 
through too-tall corn 
“He Who Walks 
Behind the Rows” 
thrash guitars mugging 
sky cult kiddos 
with bloodied choppers 
flower crowns wilting
in hair slacker 
slashers file into streets
top-secret hackers reeking 
in airtight doom rooms 
80s malls forever 
our screens the screams 
of teens every parents’ 
fear & perverse dream 
ah there’s familiar Freddy 
newly manicured 
so settle in this is going 
to be classic 
male violence 
& she sits with witching 
eyes warming 
waters & bears 
with nowhere to 
go radioactive ribs 
alien feelings under 
ominous moon cliché 
full shadows of 
fools ignore the 
feeling of fear 
tremble if you 
must banal waking 
hours horror almost 
invisible comes to 
play—