An Execution - Maybe the Prisoner was Already Dead - poem

Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com

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