Maybe the Prisoner was Already Dead
“...he stepped slightly aside to avoid a puddle on the path.”
-George Orwell, “A Hanging”
Evening. Maybe he was already dead
Dead long before the State boys strapped him down
And a functionary started an I.V. drip
Left arm? Or right? In a cinder-block room
Fluorescent lights
With windowed faces posted on both sides
Testaments to the protocols of death
The liturgy of falling away because
He and the lads murdered a helpless man
Fluorescent lights
He breathed. And then he didn’t. His bowels let go
And did they put a Band-Aid on the wound?
Fluorescent lights
But now
Let’s go outside and feel the wind
We live
Apr 25, 2019
Apr 25, 2019 at 4:01 PM UTC
Maybe the Prisoner was Already Dead
“...he stepped slightly aside to avoid a puddle on the path.”
-George Orwell, “A Hanging”
Evening. Maybe he was already dead
Dead long before the State boys strapped him down
And a functionary started an I.V. drip
Left arm? Or right? In a cinder-block room
Fluorescent lights
With windowed faces posted on both sides
Testaments to the protocols of death
The liturgy of falling away because
He and the lads murdered a helpless man
Fluorescent lights
He breathed. And then he didn’t. His bowels let go
And did they put a Band-Aid on the wound?
Fluorescent lights
But now
Let’s go outside and feel the wind
We live
Your ‘umble scrivener’s site is:
Reactionarydrivel.blogspot.com.
It’s not at all reactionary, tho’ it might be drivel.
Lawrence Hall’s vanity publications are available on amazon.com as Kindle and on bits of dead tree: The Road to Magdalena, Paleo-Hippies at Work and Play, Lady with a Dead Turtle, Don’t Forget Your Shoes and Grapes, Coffee and a Dead Alligator to Go, and Dispatches from the Colonial Office.