Aphelion Issue 301, Volume 28
December 2024 / January 2025
 
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The Vampire

by Alexis Child


Memories file past
Like black hearses
In my soul
O’ bitterness, death

Autumn casts off its skin
Dying like a leaf
Stop the carnage

I cannot sleep for dread
My pillow is like a tombstone
Of the dead
I must rid myself of all regret
Beautiful chaos

I remember, I remember
Burning circles in dust
At my writing desk
I will forgive, forget in a minute

The chasm stares back
At all my shortcomings
I wish for everything
And nothing all at once
Perhaps this is Judgment Day
No safe house to protect

I think upon my beloveds
A saint and a muse left
Without resurrection
Songs of hope are left unsung

They gave of their world
Their throne, their kingdom
The moon afraid to rise
Gives day to the sun

Between two worlds
What cannot be destroyed?
The oracle has spoken
Let us listen to the voice
Of the cauldron

It whispers all day long
The mystic murmur of Sibyl sings
The witch will neither sink nor swim
And a fallen star is a fallen star

We can think ourselves into
Anything at all
The sins of the wicked and
All their misdeeds
The heads of saints and the
Blood of Jesus

A Shaman's smoke will lead
You here
To all the lies of the human heart
More constant than the constellations
And all their courses

With a mind possessed
A midnight scribble
I wake up the dead

Madness in my head
Y'know, I've made my bed
With the taste of holy death

In dreamless sleep
Soaked in blasphemy
Enthrall my wandering spirit
Of bright visions and darkness

Like the stab of a knife
Come cadavers and kisses
Resurrect this vampire’s carcass
The hunger is mine in fear and light

Come thou, my cloaked friends
I long for home where the dead cry
Out in ferocious anguish!


© 2023 Alexis Child. All rights reserved until the bones decompose…

Alexis Child hails from Toronto, Canada; home to dreams and nightmares. Alexis is a former Social Service Worker, befriending the demons that roam freely amongst her writings. She had a small measure of underground success with her gothic rock and darkwave bands in the past. Besides having rare mystical experiences she hopes are not just short circuits in the brain, she offers Tarot Readings and writes poetry and fiction, starving in the garret with her muse. A starving child is a frightful sight. A starving vampire is even worse. Please donate non-perishable food items and B-negative blood (and make it a double!).

Alexis' fiction has been featured in Danse Macabre, Schlock, Screams of Terror, and U.K.'s Dark of Night Magazine. Her poetry has been featured in numerous online and print publications, including Aphelion, The Horror Zine, Illumen, Metaphysical Times, Night to Dawn, ParABnormal Magazine, The Sirens Call and elsewhere. Her first collection of poetry, Devil in the Clock, a dark and sinister slice of the macabre is available on Amazon. Her second collection of poetry, Singing the Bones, is available on Amazon and from Cyberwit Publishing. Her third collection of poetry, Exquisite Corpse, is coming soon. You have been warned...

Visit her website: http://www.angelfire.com/poetry/alexischild/ and her YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCg6S5u4yX73kA1ZWGnKaEBA/videos

Find more by Alexis Child in the Author Index.

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