"As Hell is Depicted," from The Men's Orange Diary [by Bog, trans. Kallikantzaros and Wight]

The first ghost breathed as little as possible and bled herself into a secret cup to keep young and calm. She ate only cold soup, took salts, sipped Madeira. The rake moved her up against the brick wall, hiked up her skirt and put his hand in like a pie knife. He made her keep singing while he dropped to his knees to put his whole mouth on her like a sea creature, non-specific.

The second ghost was their child, a three year old fawn* who fell into a well on his grandma's farm. He existed, lonesome and well-bound for two more years, mothered and fathered by cowbirds of each type until the genus was exhausted: Brown-headed, Shiny, Bronzed, Giant, Screaming.  

The third ghost was the fawn's ball cap, found in a drunkle rig. Then everyone believed the worst of everyone else. Plus fire, storm, economy.

In a town swallowed up (by fires, storms, economy), appetite itself became the fourth ghost ever recorded. There was lead time while children faded and the potholes were never filled in, but eventually the post office was boarded up.

A carriage museum culminated in the fifth, after its curator fell down dead in the catalogue hall. His body crumpled to dust. Because no one ever visited the carriage museum.


*poss. goat