POEMS ABOUT MURDER

THEIR APARTMENT

Dim light filters through yellow fog and smoke-stained glass
and reflects from retorts and the dark glitter of ink jars,
the warm gloss of a violin, the bright threads in a Persian slipper,
the gilt lettering on the shelves of books.
A mouse-colored dressing gown tossed over the chair
is redolant with pipe-smoke and coffee, chemicals and rosin.
Dust covers the morocco-covered case in the corner
and the edges of the framed photographs on the wall.
Newspapers lie stacked in one corner,
next to copies of the Lancet and the Strand
beneath a mantlepiece set with gasogene and tantalus.
Nobody ascend the seventeen steps from the front door
to break the pensive silence, but
below, the landlady hums to herself as she cooks
and keeps a eye on the sidewalk through the window.

SANSON'S SILENCE

Blood covers the scaffold
And spills into the street.
The guillotine releases
Another from its embrace.
Bodies stacked like firewood,
Heads like loaves of bread,
as Sanson gently escorts a lady
Who steels herself against his touch
And against the grisly sight.

A gentleman, he lowers her,
Makes sure her skirts are discreet,
Fastens her to the bascule,
Tilts it with a gentle hand,
And fastens her head into the lunette,
Fingers brushing the short locks
Cropped above her neck.

“Be brave,” he murmurs
Before straightening
And releasing the blade.

While the blood sprays the hungry crowd
He puts a crimson hand over his breast
Where her raven locks
Shorn by his own hand
That morning
Rest against his heart.

GERALDINE HADAKER
April 1940

She could be resting
in that way of 5-year-olds,
one hand flung carelessly to the side,
one hand on her bare tummy.
One leg bent,
the other straight,
her eyes fixed on the ceiling shadows,
her mouth open with concentration.
But a shoe lies under one leg
and her shirt is bunched
uncomfortably under her shoulders
and she doesn’t move to adjust it.

MISS SAMUELSON
1932

A battered brown leather trunk
shipped to Los Angeles.
When nobody picks it up
He hoists it out of the pile
and unsnaps the locks
and shouts in terror
at the four pieces of Miss Samuelson.
Later, in the county morgue,
they put her back together,
upper half,
lower half,
two legs
and take a photograph.

CHARNAL KNOWLEDGE

In the movies there is
No sudden release of the bowels,
no stink from the gut-shot.
No screaming and pleading,
cursing and writhing,
trying to hold the intestines in
as they bulge against gory fingers
in an ecstacy of release.

No postmortem lividity,
no gases bloating chest and stomach,
no flies laying eggs on the eyes,
and corners of the mouth.
No oozing as the bodily juices are purged
from nose and mouth.
No slippage as the epidermis
peels away like stockings and gloves.
No smell of putrefaction
to perfume the air.

FINIS

Marionette Death
Dances.
Brittle, dry,

Death rustles
Like autumn leaves.

In the end,
Silence wins.