Memories of Hamlet

Psychic sensations. Conversations

with ghosts. Mesmerized by revenge,

Ophelia on the cliff, armies coming.

The drums pound; the drums pound.

The clashing of swords.

The clashing of paths.

***

"You killed my father;

you took my mother as your bride.

You killed my father;

prepare to die!"

***

Imminent psychic sensations,

conversations with angry ghosts.

Vows shared among a trifecta

as a ghost wanders a castle.

"To thine own self be true."

An agreement

between the thin veil.

***

Ophelia seeking his advances.

Ophelia wandering

among the roses and thorns.

She is forgotten

in the shade.

She is forgotten

in the demise.

She is forgotten

as the Ghost King

plots his revenge.

Hamlet possessed, obsessed,

and undressed. Friends,

what friends are there?

Spies all around and in the court.

Love letters

"To be or not to be?"

Ophelia used as a pawn to test

Hamlet's madness.

Guilty, guilty, guilty!

The Ghost King manifests.

Love letters

never read.

Ophelia

set to pasture.

The Ghost king manifests:

half stuck in purgatory.

Gertrude thinks her son

will kill her. She screams

and locks the door.

***

The raging of the drums

and the blaring

of the trumpets.

Madness or sanity;

madness or sanity?

***

Polonius's body

rising to the stars.

Sealed letters

and unmarked ships.

Sealed letters

to England.

Requests to kings:

execution requests.

Ophelia on the edge.

She wonders about the roses

at the bottom of the creek.

The madness spreads,

infects, and grows.

The living and the dead

switching places.

Drowning and poisoned wine.

***

Letters from Hamlet, ships

bound for England, pirates,

and gravediggers.

Hamlet

holds

the

skull

of

his

childhood

friend,

Yorick.

"Alas, poor Yorick."

The dirge to the fallen lady.

The screams of strings

and the screams of woodwinds.

A fight with Laertes.

The brawl in the graveyard.

Fist to fist.

Poison and deaths, swords

and death. All rolling together.

Hamlet

begs

Horatio

to

live

and

tell

his

story.

***

The Danish royal crown broken:

split into pieces.

The revenge dissipating

into a patchwork of misgivings.

The aftermath

of a brother

killing

his brother.