The Witching Hour

[good4somethingbum]

The Witching Hour ©2015 Robert George BMI

Late one evening I was hiking on the bayou
And I lost my bearings in the murky bog
I passed snakes and frogs and crickets,
And then through a foggy thicket
Was a black cat on a ferry made of logs
Darkness had descended slowly on the lowlands
Distant hilltops wore it like a witch’s hat
And though I was feeling wary,
I still stepped aboard that ferry
As if somehow I had been invited by the cat

To the witching hour

Well, that ferry floated to another shoreline
Then that black cat vanished in the silver mist
From the shore I saw a tin shack,
With a tiny boneyard in back
Where a girl named Esmerelda met me with a kiss
And her dark brown eyes were wells of love and myst’ry
And her home had panther hides for window drapes
She was beautiful and buoyant,
And her smile was clairvoyant
And it told me there was no retreating or escape

From the witching hour

Then she called me to her with commanding gestures
Time and fate were dancing on her fingertips
She had powders, pills and lotions,
And she poured a steaming potion
Then she lifted up a crystal chalice to my lips
Then she lit a candle in a purple votive
And she raised her potion for a midnight toast
Was she mistress of the Tarot,
Daughter of an ancient Pharoah
Was tomorrow somehow tethered to a mystic post

In the witching hour

I awoke and dawn burned brightly on the bayou
As if heaven’s hand had touched a match to straw
Soft wind whispered in the thistles,
And its words were dark epistles
Written by a shadow queen who hailed from Shangri-La
Somehow she was gone and I was headed homeward
Back to iPhone apps and endless time clock days
Mundane life has little meaning,
O but sometimes when I’m dreaming
Then a friendly black cat shows me secret passageways

To the witching hour

All our memories will one day leave this earthly zone
Silent puffs of spirit through a chimney in our bones
Skulls grow deaf and blind and dumb to all they had before
Yet I know my teeth will taste her name forevermore

On the witching hour