Photo Annette Marie Hyder


It still
Annette Marie Hyder

Along a Minnesota street
that does not have a plethora of props —
pumpkins perched on every edge
purloined spider web
wart-pimpled witches
and "candy porn" —
it still looks like Halloween to me.

Halloween's bones show through
the ragged dress of branch and leaf.
The night will wear pumpkins as earrings
dance down the streets
flirting with every scarecrow
ghost and zombie she sees
peer through the eyes
of every revelers mask
and drink fright in large gulps
as if it is an autumn brew
in a bottomless flask
and she just turned twenty-one.

Halloween is looking for a good time
and she is bound to get it.
But for now she quietly waits
for the sky to grow dark —
her timepiece that tells her what o' the clock.
She'll meet you at seven at every crossroads
and on every block.