For this year's Halloweensie contest, Susanna Leonard Hill's mandatory words were glow-in-the-dark, goosebumps, and goodies. So I kept going with the alliteration and came up with a little something. Enjoy!

 It’s Halloween (WC 95)

As autumn arrives

Apparitions aren’t afraid

Of the afterlife anymore.

Aha!

It’s Halloween.

Cadavers cackle

and corpses creep

From cemetery crypts.

Keep calm!

It’s Halloween.

Demons in the darkness

And devils in disguise 

Dredge up dreadful deeds.

Don’t despair!

It’s Halloween.

Glow-in-the-dark goblins

And ghosts in gowns

Give goosebumps, not goodies.

Goodness gracious!

It’s Halloween.

Mummies masquerade

In the mysterious moonlight

Among a mausoleum.

Oh my!

It’s Halloween.

Scary skulls 

And spine-chilling specters

Startle superstitious spirits.

So spooky!

It’s Halloween.

Terrible tricks

And terrific treats 

Thrilling times on the thirty-first.

That’s a wrap!

It’s Halloween.

Fall Frenzy 2021

Thanks to Kaitlyn Sanchez and Lydia Lukidis, I wrote a little something for this year's Fall Frenzy. This piece is very different from what I usually write. But like me, it's short and moody -- ha, ha.  It's based on this image:

Halloween- Credit: Samantha Hurley / Burst

The Tortured (WC98)

The tattooed arm lunged through the darkness wielding a rusty blade.

The man dragged me across the field and into the abandoned shed.

My scream was lost in the pitch-black night as his knife dug through my cranium

-- deeper and deeper -- into my soul. Time after time, he jabbed through my tough exterior,

spilling my guts onto the splintered table. Then he deliberately carved out my eyes and slit

my nose. One by one he knocked out my teeth.

Fortunately, I felt no pain, even as he set fire to my body.

Halloween is torture for a pumpkin.