One of our creepy poems taken from our collection “No Rhyme or Reason” in honor of Halloween.
STELLA DORE’S PARK
Swing away swing, with nobody there
In a park that is vacant there’s a charge in the air.
Its midnight in New Orleans at Stella Dore’s Park.
It’s November chilly and frightfully dark.
A rogue phantom wind, that has yet to appear,
Still the swing swings away as my heart fills with fear.
I cross through the park, pass a slide when I see
The dirt billow up, someone’s dragging their feet.
I stop to stand quiet, as I struggle to hear
The sound of a child, laughing softly o’er there.
Her fierce, cold derision can be heard in her tone.
Though I can’t see the vision, she sounds sad and alone.
My first frightful instinct, apprehensively smart,
Was to flee from the imp that haunts Stella Dore’s Park.
But something about her seemed to beckon me near
To the ghostly, young sprite who sat swinging o’er there.
I pass by the merry go round as it spins
When the pixie declares she’ll confess her dark sins.
I ignore the sound reason in the back of my mind,
And confront the cross spirit, who was in the wrong time;
“You should go to the light, where the voice calls to you.”
The swing jerked to a halt, the air turned a red hue.
“My mommy has left me, but said she’d return,
Then a stranger came callin’ and his evil did burn.”
My mind how it races, my heart feels the sting,
Of the girl in the park, who’s condemned to a swing.
Then I finally see what I once only heard
The madness apparent, the vision absurd.
I can see the tears fall from her pain though it’s dark,
As she tells of a rape in Stella Dore’s Park.
The Cajun born lass gave a date, 1810
“Only three hours left ‘til I see him again.”
Then, she spoke of a crime that took place long ago
And a man in a cape, that refused to hear no.
She whimpered her warning of a creature so black
That his crime against her is what held her soul back.
I asked for the name of a man that would do
Such a thing to a child, and she said, “Monsieur Bleu.”
She points to her swing, and says hushed like to me
“He comes here at night ‘round a quarter past three.
And he speaks to me now, just as he did then,
As if I never died, as if he never sinned.
I live in this park spellbound by the deed
Yet his sin lingers on while I wait to be freed.
For these grounds I do roam, with no hope of escape,
Reliving this horror, transfixed in this state.
Behind Stella Dore’s gates I swing ever day
If condemned to this park, then it’s I who must pay.
But now that you’re here, I feel justice shall bend,
For this night you came callin’ and for me he did send.
Upon entering this park, you can finally see
That our lives have crossed paths so that I may go free.”
“He’s gone little girl you are free now at last.
He can no longer hurt you, for his evil has passed.
You have nothing to far, he has fled from this earth.
It’s your shame of his crime that has made you accursed.”
Then the ghost turned indifferent as she played with her hem
While she hummed a strange tune, then she curtseyed and said.
“It is you who should fear this poisoned ground’s dread,
Yet you willingly entered the Park of the Dead.
For in Stella Dore’s playground the swinging’s the vice
As he hand-picks his victims with a child to entice.”
I stayed sure and strong, scolding her mischief but good,
Still she paid me no mind, ‘stead she looked toward the woods
Then back to her swing, sounding smug yet subdued
She cordially presented her dark friend, Monsieur Bleu.
As I turned and beheld, through a thick patch of trees
A strange-gangly man stood there, staring at me.
Then he floated toward me, least a foot off the ground
Till he reached me and said, “What’s our sweet Abby found?”
He spoke the ole tongue, while pretending to pout,
“Qu’y at-il, ma che’rie? Has the child turned you out?
You were wrong to assume that my power ends here,
Just as you were wrong that sweet Abby’s sincere;
Yet consider, if you will, why this ghost acts so glum,
When it’s she who has picked this cursed park for her home.
Though I’m far too aware, of my perverse soul’s decline
It is painfully clear her lust far exceeds mine.”
I gasped as he grabbed me, threw his cape back then said.
“Now you’ll join clever Abby, in the park of the dead.
But tell me first lass, ‘fore I vanquish your world.
Who is the monster, Monsieur Bleu, or the girl?”
From Inion N. Mathair
