Tag Archives: Halloween

The More the Scarier

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The More the Scarier

When a single apparition tried to haunt the candy store,
they just admired his costume and gave him one treat more
than all the trick or treaters who’d appeared before his visit.
I wonder if his timing isn’t very good or is it?

When he planned his visit, he was counting on horrific,
but when the owner simply said his costume was terrific,
his esteem somehow defrayed his disappointment that
the only creature that he seemed to scare was just the cat.

He returned to the graveyard and stirred his sleeping mate,
insisting on their return—this time as double date.
And their double-haunting in fact turned out so well,
 next year they’re showing up with all the denizens of hell!!!!

Prompt words today are apparition, costume, horrific, esteem and mate. Image by Kevin Escate on Unsplash.

Degrees of Possession

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Degrees of Possession

When a ghost is newly dead and lacking in his knowledge,
is it perhaps required of him to go to haunting college?
Does he become a boogeyman, thereby saving face
only when he’s studied hard and learned to glide with grace
up the stairs and down the stairs and way down to the basement,
polishing his scary moves and practicing debasement?
Will he then earn the esteem of every other ghoul
who passed his apprenticeship at apparition school?

Prompt words for the day are haunting, college, boogeyman, esteem and grace.

Yes, that’s me scaring my sis Patti way back when I was trying to earn my spook degree. If you can think of a better name for this poem, please suggest it. This was as good as I could do.

Trick or Treat

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Trick or Treat

On Halloween, every child has faith
that if they show up as a zombie or wraith
and say “Trick or Treat!” and hold out their hand,
that simply by making  this threatening demand,
the folks will produce a sugary treat.
Then quick as a whip, they’ll make their retreat.
Impelled by the promise of one reward more,
they’re off to pound on another closed door.

Without maps, without compass, they’ll all zero in
on former houses where they have been
that give the best treats, like whole Hershey bars,
their parents all sitting, resigned, in their cars,
monopolized drivers one night of the year—
giving independence, yet hovering near,
and perhaps making sure that the threat clearly stated,
if the treat’s not a good one, though surely debated,

never comes true. No car windows soaped,
no trees that are left gaily toilet-roll-roped.
Over decades, this holiday’s earned such renown,
that  it’s the same in town after town.
Small ghosts and small ghouls and witches and fairies
go house-to-house restating their queries
and as though it is magic, no one can resist
a candy-filled pumpkin hung from a small wrist.

Prompt words today are: compass, monopolize, wraith, impel and hand.

Best Halloween Decoration Ever! (For Tourmaline’s Halloween Challenge: Decor)

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Click on link below to see more photos:

Guy Builds Massive Skeleton That Bursts From His Home for Halloween

 

For Tourmaline’s Halloween Challenge: Decor

Hallofourthofvalenmas: How It Came to Be.

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Okay! Prompt words for the day are knockers, combination, festival, beseech and sentence. What in the world would you do with a combination of words like that? Think of that before you  judge me for this:

Hallo-fourthof-valen-mas

This festival’s the weirdest of any that I’ve seen—
a crazy combination of Christmas and Halloween.
The hire-a-Santa in the mall wears bear paws on his feet
and when the kids climb on his lap, they mutter, “Trick or Treat!”
Below the Christmas wreaths above, door knockers are kept busy
as grandmas baking Yule logs are kept in a fine tizzy 
by swarms of little carolers who can barely reach
the door knockers, who gather with arms up to beseech
the homeowners for candy after every song,
then stuff it in the Christmas stockings that they brought along.

Scores of scavengers dressed  up like shepherds or like kings
as well as Virgin Marys or angels sporting wings
abandon Christmas pageants to Trick-or-Treat instead.
You might ask me by what edict the world was made to wed
Halloween and Christmas? What legislative body
chose two celebrations equally over-gaudy
and mixed them both together to try to regulate
the number of occasions  on which we celebrate?

I think it was the W-H-O that thought up this solution
to try to deal with Covid and to try to curb pollution,
then issued this weird sentence and made us all comply
to celebrate all holidays on the fourth of July!
And so in combination with the skeletons and holly,
as witches and small ghosts are enjoined to act more  jolly,
fireworks are exploding in the sky far up above,
and as they trick-and-treat they also express love
by handing out their valentines—kill two birds with one stone
by trading hearts for Hershey bars with a ghostly moan.
And that’s how Hallo-fourthof-valen-mas has come to be
the only time when we’re allowed a group festivity.
And since part of it’s Halloween, without being asked
every guest, no matter what their politics, comes fully masked!!!

Prompt words for the day are knockers, combination, festival, beseech and sentence.

Florida Halloween Costume

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Hilarious

A Halloween Bedtime Story

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Click on photos to increase your terror!

A Halloween Bedtime Story

There’s a world that is intangible except at Halloween.
It teems with banshees and with ghosts at other times unseen.
Strange monsters with long fingers and pumpkins for a head
lurk inside your closet, hang out under your bed.

When they finally emerge, it does no good to shout.
They’ll grab you in their mighty grasp and turn you inside out.
Put your arms outside the covers or one foot on the floor,
and you’ll provide a tasty lunch the monsters will adore.

For once they have a single limb securely in their clench,
they’ll have you all in seconds. Your destruction is a cinch!
Though Halloween is much beloved by all you candy lovers,
Once at home and snug in bed, best stay beneath the covers!

Prompt words today are  pumpkin, mighty, intangible, banshee, cinch, inside out.

Monster Mash

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Halloween was in the air

Monster Mash

When wind howls like a banshee to fill the dark night air
and monsters lurk in closets or in creakings up the stair,
when your brother knows they’re out there––these creatures he can’t see,
when nightmares wake you up at night and you have to pee
but daren’t leave your bed in fear those creatures will come “getcha”
(all those night-born monsters that come out at night to fetch ya,)
or when sister wets the bed again and seeks a drier nest,
for lying on her soggy sheets, she knows she’ll never rest––
it’s times like these when all the kids form a small tribunal
and determine that their parents’ bed should be declared communal.

 

For Tangerine’s Halloween Challenge.–Monster

Halloween Is 47 Days Away!!

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I must reblog this hilarious illustration by A.M. Moscoso at “My Enduring Bones.”