it wasn’t an accident
to commit such a crime
bodies falling in a line
symmetrical, detestable
with the measured hand
of a stable man

to take a knife
to a wife is what we call
a crime of desperation
but in the range the
****** of a stranger
stranger still must have
a plan
he is a man
and a man of mind
of careful calculation

because only a man
who has reached this place
not rashly
to raise above
the smoke and ashes
knows what kind of
clarity it takes
to take away what
man himself can’t make

he knew
that we’d put on a fuss
to save our face
he knows
the joke’s on us