On Courting The Ghost.

( A Sermon.)

Hands up anyone here,

I say hands up anyone here,

who has never, NEVER, made love

.... to a ghost.

Yes, I thought as much,

for how compliant they are, gentlemen,

these amorous phantoms,

these seductive sprites,

how nice and flattering, ladies,

these spectral charmers,

these ghostly gallants,

anticipating what most pleases us

as perfectly as we ourselves might,

and never dallying any longer than required,

no squabbling, no awkwardness,

no space for disillusionment,

for truth to unfold.

Of course, being dead, they defy time,

gratifying now, no waiting,

all past incompletions now made complete,

all longings instantly met

in a whirl of rosy romance

and unlimited hazy love-making.

Tell me. How are the living to compete

with all that airy idealness?

Yes, even within the lawful embrace

of our most beloved, solid and true,

they intrude their elastic limbs,

still proffering, even there,

their fantastic wares,

daring to question the adequacy

of reality itself.

But, be warned! Be warned!

Gentlemen, ladies, be warned!

Ghosts make ghosts,

and with each intoxicating bout,

however seemingly harmless,

they drag us further down,

down into their murky underworld

where all tongues and their twisty talk

and where all shapely forms

are revealed as the serpentine weaving

of so many lying slithering dreams,

and where everything, however once sparkling,

is exposed at last as just dust,

nothing but dead dust,

dry and comfortless.

Hymn 69.

Keep us in Thy light, the honest light of day;

keep us in Thy light, for this we humbly pray.