Fear

I lived a life so secure
bound by my home
a mundane existence, a mere clerk
for a gambling house

but write I must of this strange happening
nay more eerie than strange
it was enough to whiten my hair
which was once a bush of black

I woke at dawn with normal anticipation
looked out of the window and froze
for it wasn't my garden that I saw
but a swamp with sinister quality

upon its dark oily water lay
all manners of decay
the sinister air was heavy
with scents that was unmentionably putrid

From the depth of this black slime
bubbles broke to the surface
and from it horrors of horror
a hideous monstrous figure emerged

I held back a nauseating fear
for the horrible creature looked familiar
and when it called my name
I knew it was my grandfather

I cringed in fear and revulsion
for he had died long ago
screaming to God for forgiveness
in the sanatorium

for he had murdered my mother
who birthed me, thinking she
was his unfaithful wife
she was strangled with hardy twine

I screamed and jumped back from the window
and the scene just disappeared
I breathed in thankful relief
that it was a waking dream

but what of the smell...
it clung to my hair all day.


*this poem was entered in a competition here.thank you for reading*