Two Friday the Thirteenth Poems

November 13, 2015
By Alexis Faulkner 

The scariest thing to happen to me today

On this unlucky Friday

I’ve been possessed

Listening to a classic house mix playlist

Pause, tilt head right, thought mist disperse

Glance up and to the right to an earlier fall-spiced night

This same month, sure

Sitting on the stoop with a visitor

Visitor II came past us, but with their own key

Said, formed the words, as form in him human,

“Don’t worry, I’m just the night mailman.”

Sure, I thought, nothing to see here

Turned the key to the left and pushed the door open

Our apartment, the door

It’s tricky and it’s not like they were new to the task

My eyes didn’t close like Brautigan’s did

Because, in fact, I’m still not in California

My stoop is in a seasonally affected zone

Where people of the post office act on a different code of ethics

A code all their own and full of fright

Good thing he wasn’t delivering on a Friday the 13^th

Perhaps then he would have deposited anthrax in our box

Which love is, to reference another dry moment in time

Hopscotch
by Douglas Slayton 

that black cat kept me warm
in every storm and frozen evening
the windows wouldn't close

salt on my shoulder
won't dispel that hex
i picked up some winter

i can't cross a street or portal
anymore with that luck i carry
i wanted to make this right
but it's all wrong

i can't look them in the eye anymore
every room, every street,
where everyone else stands close
i see them looking
like they can smell it on me



[found the image here]

Alexis Faulkner is Executive Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine. 

Doug Slayton is Professor Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.