old ghost we know
you are your work

it was only you
holding on to dark expectations

we tolerated your critical presence
while your hidden lenses
tracked and tricked us into
timeless corridors of distortion

slinking down
you slanted us deeper
into hidden negativity
all concealed
in a hovering ancestral will of deceit
barely detectable
primitive
secure in its other directives

who would believe
you would tighten
and frighten us
but we resisted
if only by catching
some clear sun
through a light
in the door