Ghosts and Shadows


from the ABC set Poetry

We haunt this deserted landscape between
all the ruins of what were once our lives.
We have become mere shadows now, or ghosts.
What remains of us haunts these broken buildings

We become ghosts, pale and insubstantial
unable to push against reality,
the solidity of this existence.
We seep through the world like liquid, like gas.

We move like silence between these still stones
and the empty spaces that still remain
to remind us of what was once our land
where we are now only shadows and ghosts.

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Comments

Ewan | January 28, 2008 - 13:53

I can't make up my mind about this one. It does 'move me', for want of a better expression. I do like the 'We, we, we' start to the stanzas.

'We become ghosts' (and only that part of that particular line) grates on me a little. Maybe something like 'We are phantoms, pale and insubstantial' would work better (but maybe not for you).

I realise that you probably made a conscious choice to repeat ghosts (and shadows for that matter), for me it doesn't quite work.

That said: an interesting - and thought-provoking -piece.

Regards Ewan