He walks among us
Closer than we care or dare to admit.
RTA, DOA,
Plane crash, massacre, earthquake:
He is there.
No pasty-faced zombie or blood-drained undead
Staring black-eyed, hollow cheeked with extended fangs
And beckoning palms, him.
Instead he stands in
Garrulous crowds
Or stiff and silent queues.
He is the crowd,
He is the queue.
Telephoto lens: flash, flash, flash,
Then he’s away.
A professional, this one.
Another takes a grisly souvenir:
A fragment of glass from a bloodstained windscreen;
A lock of hair from a severed head;
A ring from a corpse’s finger.
Ghoul:
He doesn’t kiss like a vampire;
Doesn’t leer like a madman.
His face is the colour of warm flesh;
His eyes are alive
And, with wounded innocence,
Stare back at his accuser from the bathroom mirror.
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