By Colin Ahern – Contributors

Plunging beneath cobbled streets, gas lamps flicker along Paris’ ethereal twilight; 

Here lies yesterday’s umbra.

Our torches, rebuking darkness, shed a hundred yearning veils of yellowish curiosity against Bone-chiseled visages. 

The air is dense, each breath pulls specks of dust and bone into our lungs. Perhaps I exaggerate. Straying from the walls, air lacks the grit of bone, the ceiling above is stone—carved and split. 

In lieu of golden filigree, bones, meticulously arranged, adorn the halls. 

Processions of candles illuminate the ossuary, 

Casting abyssal dancing bodies against moss-kissed stone; 

Death approaches.

It’s akin to wandering through a dream—a dream where torchlight, 

Devoid of daylight’s hues, 

Plays amidst a sepulcher of mold and neglect. 

Deeper into the void, 

The Catacombs reveal a tortive realm where dead lingers with living. 

Eroded limestone walls cradle the bones of those who once trod the sunlit boulevards above; Now they cradle us too.