Never, Never, the Ouija Board 

To believe in ghosts seems a foolish thing

(even ghosts don’t believe in themselves).

Yet in the darkness my eyes have seen

a message spread beneath the needle,

slowly spelling out belated warning: 

Never buy the Ouija board—

cardboard casket gathering mold, 

there among the Chutes and Ladders, 

Troubles and Monopolys, Scrabbles, glassware and dust, 

at the neighbor’s estate sale, the farm auction, 

at grandma’s garage sale:

Never play the Ouija board—

that your parents played at parties;  

or you, huddled in your attics and basements; 

Victorians in séance; relatives in wartime; 

psychics in tents; gypsies in wagons;

each and every soul that pushed the planchette:

                        Never ask the Ouija board—

your breathless teenage questions, 

laughing off slumber party fears,

explaining off the unexplained 

that you imagine you only imagined there: 

wisp of breeze, candle flicker, creak, thump, or whisper:

Never heed the Ouija board—

despite that call, that soul-sound 

that tugs at you, and draws you in; 

more alluring than Odyssean siren songs,

more insidious than secret spiders that burrow in your ears,

or the unsuspected worm quietly nibbling at your brain: 

Never touch the Ouija board—

that each of us has fingered;

pushing that plastic, summoning that specter,

idiomatic reflex, haptic jerks;

each of us, with naïve concentration,

channeling ourselves into that cursed vessel:

                        Never trust the Ouija board—

that sucks and steals immortal souls,

storing them, imprisoning them, biding its time;

binding your spirit within the game,

until at last, when your body grows blue,

the one the next player will summon is you.

                        Never to escape the Ouija board—

Never form a circle. Never clasp a hand.

Never, ever, draw a star.    

Light no candles, tell no lies.

Do not ask of strangers.

Say your prayers at bedtime, and teach your children well:

                        Never, Never, the Ouija board