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Richard Bell

The January Featured Poet is Richard Bell

Please feel free to email Richard at rick@ricknightmare.com

Richard Bell

LEVIATHAN

From the rafters in the sullen tower 
The ravens flee, a screeching blast 
Leviathan sits chilled by silence 
He fears the future falling fast 
His rasping breath a stinking haar
That utters imprecations foul 
This sunless world his icy depths 
He wears his hate like scarlet cowl 
Leviathan a haunted beast 
A gargoyle’s hunched and gnarly gait
Awaits release from death mask wish 
A monster in his grim estate.

ADUMBRATE

The yellow light that shines between the wax and wane of silver glow
The lure is fixed in outline hid behind the shape I always knew
Silence is a penance for the conjured thoughts in throws of fright
My shadow whispers venom in my startled ears that fear it’s right

In recess placed
In chasms lost 
In endless maze is found the mind
It is tortured more for pleasure by Monsters claiming its design
The creature that is me 
But isn’t me 
In blood in flesh in life
Is puppet without strings 
A true reflection 
Without a mirror’s kife

Is it superstition when another walks across its form?
From folklore to the science book it’s short in frost and 
Long in warmth
My shadow whispers venom in my startled ears that fear it’s right

It shows me as I am and 
As the day delivers me to night
Am I two, a darkened soul and One that hides it from the day?
Am I two, adumbral mute and 
One that doesn’t fear to say?
Am I two, from underworld and One that opens with the sun?
Am I two, a lie that shares a truth from when my life began?

And when the black cloud hides away my other self 
My fear subsides
And when returned I see the depths where chaos and potential hide
My shadow whispers venom in my startled ears that fear it’s right

And deep in me is stirring nascent darkness triggered by the light.

LIGHT MY PUMPKIN SKULL

The tenth month on day thirty one is a date 
When the calendar runs red and bursts into flames 
When the spirits of madness and legend alight 
From their bondage, in mystery, in nether world flight 
When minds conjure demons to carve in the squash
And hope their reflections in evil are quashed
When children make costumes to mimic the beasts 
They travel in packs through the streets for a feast 

The air has a chill that is drawn from the grave 
The Ouija acceptance of spirits enslaved 
They're bound to the folklore that Sowen demands 
Corporeal phantoms let loose on these lands
And autumn winds judder the flames inside Jack
And sometimes extinguish their leer back to black 
The creeps in the graveyards, the ghouls in the halls 
The basement incarnates, the eyes in the walls 

The haze on the moorland, the screams from beyond 
The gaze from behind you 
that too quick is gone
The treat or the trick and the cheerless curmudgeons 
The haunt group with night lights 'til dawn in the mansions
The sweet gifts in doorways to ward off the wraiths 
The chirk of the hinges on mansion high gates 
The cruel oxymoron of “Happy Halloween!”

The shadows in half light through ages unseen
The bête noir costumes transfixing the crowds 
The silver edge lick when the moon tastes the clouds 
The nightmare that threatens when falling asleep
Pulled under the surface and lost in the deep
Light my way home, 
Jack O’Lantern my guide 
Be my resistance

MY JEKYLL TO HYDE

Keep me above the miasma of hell 
The light of the first of the eleventh will tell 
If the myths and the magic from all time have won 
Your flame everlasting 
Our world undone.

Richard Bell has been writing horror stories for over ten years now and produces horror flash fiction, dark poetry and louche lyrics under the pseudonym, Rick Nightmare. He also writes under his real name, Richard Bell, for horror the writers and artists group, The Grueheads, with much acclaim.

His love of the genre stems from early childhood and he sites Hammer horror as his first love of the macabre. This has been made all the more exciting by his work being showcased in the UK Fragments of Fear televised project. His story, “The Storm Dreams of Children,” is to be read by Hammer star Judy Matheson and aired very soon.

He has had poetry published by Weasel Press in the Degenerates, Voices for Peace anthology and is a member of the Maleficent Me dark poetry group on Facebook.

Richard lives with his family in a sleepy hamlet in Northern England and writes mostly in the early hours—after strong cheese nightmares!