Halloween, Ohio, and an Appropriately Named Lake

See, I've reserved Lake Erie for us,
and as we push away in our canoe, our eyes
touch everything, and it turns to costume.
The sky is a negative of a ghost, a black sheet
with star-slits for eyes, the lighthouse a hero
flashing his x-ray eye, and the flagpole on the shore
is the world's tallest matador waving, Ole! Ole! Ole!

Forgive me. I'm from a state shaped like a heart,
and this thought raises my soul as though by séance:
the seaweed bending in our direction, extending a dance,
the undead eyes of infinite fish surrounding us. And me,
setting aside my oar, bobbing for you Adam's apple,
whispering, See what a haunted house my arms make.
Then like a bully child: I dare you. Spend one night inside.

Stacy Gnall, excerpt from Halloween, Ohio, and an Appropriately Named Lake

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