sheer white

A found poem excavated from page 3 of Anne Rice’s The Witching Hour (Knopf 1st edition)

I woke up afraid, dreaming of the
old house with the
moving lips, melodious insects. In bed the
quiet mistake of thinking of a
haunted city I had seen not very
long ago
infused with the hum of neon signs.
A ghost was speaking without moving his lips,
the disorientation of flies in summer,
smell of medicine.

Out of bed and
in the light of
sheer white curtains I
stop, shake the feeling of
life peering out of a
waxen dummy, a
bent head turned to the
sharp refraction of a
crystal glass.
Melted bourbon, black against a
dull head.

Drowsing, faint. This is just a —