Shadows slumber as the sun goes down

They know their time is weaker now

When the night draws in

Blotting out the day

And the darkened ones come out to play

Presently I walk the wooden road of liquid sin

Devouring the melancholy and the spirits within

Stained by the manilla flickers and absent light

Doused firmly in the night

I must look almost human

But I secrete the darkness

Through milky digits I let it flow

I follow it’s trail to the magic places of nowhere known

Into inky rivers that course defiantly through the expanse of time

Coloured only by history and the cultures I have seen

Unhindered by the trends and the fashions that destroy the fickle

The shallow, oh how I hear their cries

How they lie to themselves with graphic indignation

With their last breath they still deny

But I smile...

As Claret trails across the cracks of their skin

Deep red and pure

My cure

Eyes fix and dilate as I take all from within

Ink blots in milk

A taste of silk disseminates within me

An acrid aftertaste of metal sears my tongue

Before the brown and amber liquid of years gone by

Creates a lie

I meander the bars

The bourbon brown glow paints the walls

Captivated by raven’s eyes

Time magnifies all we see

Embers dance in the fire light

Candles try to compete with their roaring master

Their flames lick my face

A darkened affinity of acquired taste

But porcelain skin can't be burnt...

© Richard Withey. All rights reserved.

Shadows slumber as the sun goes down,

No longer naked in the light but

Covered in the darkness, sunk within

The charcoal fog as bats and starlight

Flutter like serpent tongues against

The silk of faceless space.

They are movements never noticed,

Running from flashlights as they scamper

Between the end and resurrection of sun,

They'll never know that their bodies

Are made of mist, final gasps

Of the day as it dies, reborn at dawn

As scars upon cycles of rebirth.

Shadows slumber

As the sun goes down

I shamble quiet streets

In my nightmare town

A familiar haunt

Of my childhood dreams

Quiet pastel houses

Clock my trek

In the gloaming

Ever West

In search of sun

And home and rest

I call out,

But no one's there

Save empty homes

That sit and stare

I think I am

The last alive

Such life a lie that was contrived

To lure me to this neighborhood

Foreboding future failures

My "coulda, woulda, shoulds"

I stumble on in search of truth

My wanderings but bear no fruit

And though

Despair may scheme

My spirit take

I walk in hope

For when I wake

I'll cast this darkness

Far from me

To stride tall

In the sun...one free

-DeRicki

Shadows slumber as

The sun goes down

And I envy the peace

Surrounding me 

But my demons awaken

Resurrecting in darkness

Rising to attention and 

In a dialect of mania

Shout to me backwards

In written words and

Transcribed inscriptions

Interpreting meaning

Rushing from my 

Brain tissue unfolding from

The safety of sanity lost

Swaddling me in its depth 

And my theories bleed

Rectifying pain through 

Digestion and regurgitation 

Expressed and memorialized

In subliminal poetry spoken

By the voices in my head

Shadows slumber as the sun goes down

Steve can now carry on with the schedule  he chose

He peeks around corners at the silenced town

Inching his way towards the old Gallows

Only God knows why he would choose such a place

The stories told are doubtfully exaggerated

Steve’s life is safe inside  a pocket sized case

Pacing Earth where decades of death saturated

A circle around the Gallows for that extra safe glance

As the crows “Kaw” in humor at the familiar routine

He listens for the hiss that will begin this trance

As the charmer slithers up Steve and the snake  convene

With a phantom  sting he shakes in his worn out denim

Now grabbing the snake he exposes the Fang

Deep breath eyes closed as he takes in the Venom

Again  throwing his putrid sanity out like a boomerang

He has nothing left to give and nothing left to take

Repudiate as he breaks himself down to  wither

So it seems Steve has nothing left to forsake

And not even a single thing to consider

In a place never meant to become hallow

A place that shall never hear its own hymn

For all the lives already claimed at these Gallows

Steve shall earn his rank among the fallen men

Daniel

  Jacob * and my fucked up mind

Dabney

"Shadows slumber as the sun goes down" was the third clue. Three clues, three murders and a Captain breathing down my neck wanting results.

My murder book was thin even with all three combined. The first vic white female, DOB June 1, 1943, Age 20, slight build 5 feet even. Date of murder November 25 1963. Lifestyle was conservative, nothing to indicate she was a target yet she was. First clue was "Jack jumped over the candlestick."

The second vic was male, 6 feet, white, age undetermined but possibly in his fifties. The beat blues knew him as Dirty Dan, a street wise drifter that drifted into Dallas about three years before his murder. The beat blues reports show he towed the line, was not into the drink like most are, just rough times. Date of murder, November 27, 1963. Two day after the first and nothing ties them together. His clue was "I came, I saw, I killed."

The third vic a retired reporter for the Times. DOB January 8, 1913. Murdered November 29, 1963. In town visiting his married daughter, no known enemies and no known ties to the other victims.

Autopsy on all three show knife attack from a blade much like a stiletto, one thrust between ribs into heart. Left to bleed out where they fell.

Vic 1. Murdered as she exited her job as a telephone exchange operator. 6:20 PM, no one saw or heard anything. A coworker found her shortly after.

Vic 2. Body found in alleyway, Doc figures TOD was somewhere around 7 PM. Deserted part of town, no alcohol found in system.

Vic 3. Left daughter's to go for a walk, he was despondent about JFK's assassination earlier that week. Body was discovered just under the overpass south of the book depository. TOD was placed about 8 PM, 45 minutes after leaving daughter's house. I walked it, it takes over thirty minutes to get there.

It's been two weeks and nothing, the killings have stopped. The case/s have gone cold. The Captain suggested I move on to a new case and I agreed yet... I am pissed

A month later and the first vic's mother called and they put it through, part of the job I hate but it is part of the job. She needed to talk so I let her. It was near the end of our conversation when I asked her to repeat something about her daughter and JFK.

Her daughter was very excited about the presidential visit, had a spot picked out to view as JFK drove by, she even went five hours early.

After clicking off I called victim three's daughter and asked if he had also gone to see JFK. Her reply was in the affirmative, she herself stayed home with her children.

It wasn't a break but it was something.

Next I looked at all the news footage I could and in the one piece of footage for brief moment on the overpass was my three victims. All three shoulder to shoulder, all three now connected but to what...

I took my findings into the Captain and a rare smile curled around his cigar.

His smile was short lived as the FBI, Secret Service and three guys without credentials that seemed to be the ones in charge took over.

They took everything, the murder book, autopsy files and even my notebook that contained my thoughts on the case.

The Captain and I were taken into our own integration room and left there. When they finally entered the biggest of the uglies told us they would take the investigation. If we talked we would be charged with treason and never be seen again, I believed him. He had such distain for us he never disarmed either one of us.

I have never talked about this until this very moment. I am an old man now, not much they can do to me. I'll give the night nurse my notes.

She should be here soon, I can see the sunset through my barred window casting long shadows across the floor.

Shadows slumber as the sun goes down. I watch you dancing quiet in the shadows. Entrancing me with you silent grace.  Sex and love colliding in the shadows of your form.

I want you.  Hungry and wild. But not yet.  Look at me through your scars. I will close the open wounds and surround you with love and loyalty. Dance in the shadows slumber. Overtake my soul as the sun goes down

Shadows slumber as the night goes down

mystic moon breathes from golden spout

pouring out onto naked land below.

Befouled minds venture from underground

intoxicated into night’s black oppression.

Wanton airs release the spirits of the night

roused from their darkened chambers,

drugged mist wrapping around their hearts

choking their fringes and laying them bare.

Apparitions arise from gloomy obscurity

tiptoeing on the duskiness of night clouds.

Seething souls rise from tomb encasement

to frolic with the echoes of the dead, arising,

umbilical cords entrapping as they long

for the white horde of nebulous dreams,

wailing as they seek anguished freedom.

Phantom maiden haunts transparent specters

waxy candles throwing her wraithlike image

on tombstones cast between fetid walls.

“I caused your oblivion,” she cries

to desolate souls seeking redemption

as her flesh swarms with putrid kisses

entombed with denizens of no tomorrow.

Shadows slumber as the sun goes down

From the grave blooms a nocturnal flower

A spirit evolves to desire your body

Enters like hardened steel into your mind

Shadows slumber as the sun goes down

Footsteps heavy on your chest

Heart felt caress steals your breath

Blood thickens within a darkened kiss

Shadows slumber as the sun goes down

Crawl like hands beneath your skin

Pleasures pushed beyond the limits

As death resurrects within the eyes.

~ADayDreamWriter

Shadows slumber as the sun goes down.

Darkness stalks the fading daylight,

flippantly chasing it down past the horizon.

Blackness settles in as nightmares awaken.

Sandman's dreams are dashed away

by terrors set free

to roam amid dim, dusky streets.

Innocents are unaware of being watched,

ignorant of the roulette game at play

as sinister thoughts conceive wicked deeds,

contemplation of a victim giving rise

to perverse excitement,

tremors of deviant ecstasy

bringing evil delight into glowing eyes.

Sudden footfalls,

low malevolent laughter,

a rush of air ...

then a desperate strangled scream

is the last that is heard

as another life is taken,

and another prey disappears.