The Vampire’s Lament
‘Holding hands at midnight’, he suggests to me.
Not bloody likely! I’ve been haunting this cemetery
for centuries and he comes along with that gapey grin,
handshake a raw oyster, nails like ice picks,
breath a swollen sewer and asks to be a partner?
Fang slouches between us, whiskers twitching,
a cacophony of cawing from crows eavesdropping
and the tawny owl, perched low in the beech tree,
watches everything. His head turns 180 degrees
and looks directly behind him. He is screechless.
My heart beats faster than webbed wings
of brown bats soaking up moon beams.
I tell him as sternly as I can: ‘You work your side
of the moor and I’ll work mine.’ I’ll ask the owl
what’s to be done. He never lets me down.
Mary Franklin has had poems published in Iota, The Open Mouse, Ink Sweat and Tears, London Grip, Message in a Bottle, The Stare’s Nest and various anthologies. Her tanka have appeared in poetry journals in Australia, Canada, UK and USA. She lives in Vancouver, British Columbia.