Hope Is The Ghost That Just Won’t Die

by Mac Mitchell

Backs pressed
to the pickup,
between headlights, 
counting off scars
and monsters 
on the kind 
of heartache
evening prescribed
with the smell 
of rain and the quiet
falling of twilight
to dusk.

Hearts lie
just like hospital beds
and if morning comes, 
and if they ask, we will
say we’re just fine
and play our parts 
like arthritic dancers
in a Russian ballet.

All the right words
caught behind teeth
like floss
and the night,
a waiting room
Guilt burning 
of the throat,
and the dark
dragging out
dismantled ghosts.

Mac Mitchell is a creative writing and theatre major. He writes poetry and plays, and short bios, mostly. His current favorite poets are T.S. Eliot and Neil Hilborn. His current favorite playwright is Sam Shepard.

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