A Ghost in the Evening
By JD Miller
I think I wouldn’t mind being a ghost, to some degree.
Not a full time ghost, but maybe at night, or in the evenings,
On holidays, maybe, or during awkward social encounters.
I was sitting on that bridge I like, the old railroad one,
That bisects the bike path and overhangs a creek,
Which wasn’t meant to be there at all, I imagine–
The one with all of the bulrushes, shedding their cotton layers,
And that lovely duck couple, and that Muskrat sometimes–
Who I take for a bachelor–and the grasses that grow taller than me
And that gentle water that comes from who-knows-where,
And goes nowhere at all, except right here.
I was thinking about how I’m going to miss this bridge,
Certain that I may not see it again for some time, if ever,
When a family of bikers passed under me, their spokes whirring,
All helmets buckled, and not one of them seeing me at all,
Not even my dangling feet, which I was kicking,
Like a child might in an oversized chair,
And I thought, how nice it might be to be a ghost.
For one, I could cross the street just about wherever I liked,
And really do anything just about wherever I liked,
Barring practically nothing. I could get the best views
Of whatever I wanted to see, listen to things
I probably wasn’t meant to hear.
I could probably chase away the man who is standing under the bridge,
Smoking like he owns the place, and snorting a great deal more than I wish.
And I guess I could lay claims to places that didn’t belong to me,
Because really, what was anybody going to do about it?
But honestly I think, if I was a ghost, even just part time,
I think I’d still sit right here, and watch the sun go down,
And get no reading done, even though I brought a book.
I think I would just go walk through the grass,
And dangle my feet off of all sorts of things,
At least one more time.