Death Toll

In the moonlit dusk of the receding darkness, lying in the noise, a hand is lifted.  A hand is seen.  A glimmering outline traces around the heart and a faint shadow of nothingness follows.
The owl returns, after five years passed: a symbol of tidings; a symbol of death.
The clock strikes twelve, no ten short of three.
The shadow expands.
The gloom overbends.
In the starlit corridor, by the old home's side, gliding in sheer silence, a soul wanders by.  A glimmer is seen.  An outline remains.  A trace of the heart and the hand and the same.
The piercing eyes fall upon our ghost.
The clock strikes nine.
The rest falls behind.
An owl swoops its wings and the shadow is gone.
The hand disappears.
The ghost never left.