Today’s prompt is to cast your mind back to your own childhood and write a poem about something that scared you – or was used to scare you – and which still haunts you (if only a little bit) today.

The Witch House
by ARHuelsenbeck

On the street where I grew up
three doors down
was an abandoned house.
It had the look of a haunted house,
old and worn out and dark.

One day I climbed the front steps
of the old house and
turned the doorknob.
Surprisingly, the door
was unlocked.
I went inside.

It was dark and dirty
and deathly quiet.
The rooms held no furniture,
only a few dingy, discarded items.
I went up the stairs,
and the second floor 
also showed no signs of life.

At that point I felt
uncomfortable, like the
trespasser I was.
I went back downstairs and
let myself out, closing
the door behind me.

At home, I told my mother
where I’d been.
“Don’t ever go in there again,”
she immediately warned me.

“Why doesn’t anybody live there?”
“There were two old brothers
who lived there until they 
died.”
As if that explained anything.

Years later, I saw a woman
wearing a long dark dress
standing on the front porch
sweeping.
I could tell
she was a witch.
She looked at me accusingly
as though she knew 
I had been in the house.

From that time on,
I called it the witch house.