Richard Schnap - House of the Dead / Hereafter

House of the Dead

Each room was home
To a different phantom
Buried in its own burden

The one that labored
To leave its heirs
A fortune of priceless sorrow

The one that drowned
In a lifetime of tears
As deep as any ocean

The one that learned
Too late that love
Is a coin that has two sides

But one escaped
Leaving the others
To forever haunt themselves

As it rose from the grave
To begin to compose
A story with a brighter ending

Hereafter

In the heart of the night
I hear her voice
As if she had never died

In a siren’s howl
Mouthing the wounds
The world inflicted upon her

In a passing car
Its radio blaring
A ballad both whisper and scream

In the lonesome cry
Of a distant train
Trying to escape from itself

And sometimes in the wind
Shaking the trees
That seems to come from nowhere

And in the tears of rain
In a broken rhythm
Falling from an empty sky

Richard Schnap is a poet, songwriter and collagist living in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. His poems have most recently appeared locally, nationally and overseas in a variety of print and online publications.