"Dance for me, in the hex-chambers"

Acrostic: "Headline News"

Well away from the cinder blocks and iron bars

I tell you I sleep like a baby away from the

Foam-padded cell and rubber-spoon cafeteria.

Everybody believed me when I told them I

Killed in my sleep.

I confessed to, in a dream,

Loosing grievous bodily harm to the boogey man or,

Likely my own father -- the jury nodded at that,

Each of them in tandem from the expert testimony of doctors and

Releasing me onto the streets.

Now you see me on your street or carrying

A basket around the local supermarket or we sometimes

Ride a city bus shoulder-to-shoulder, you and me,

Commuting and communing with our fellow city dwellers into the

Office where they have nothing but sympathy for me and

Loathing for you because around the water cooler you said

Everbody knew I should be strung up by the neck until dead.

Possibly; however today on the bus you are strap-hanging until dead while I

Travel on my way to the aquarium

In the park to watch the sea otters gambol in the

Cool and concrete-bound water.

Do you thrash in your sleep? Kick? Throw punches?

Every night?

Could be... at least that’s what I kept telling people.

Lab technicians hooked me up to machines and watched my

Actions while I slept.

Results showed I slept like a baby, which didn’t influence the jury.

Each sleep is different and cannot be replicated nor

Decided by a jury.

Night-time in the Kootenays,

Over a long weekend's camping trip to heal our marriage when

The man stole into our tent with a knife and I

Grabbed him in my sleep and squeezed, but awake and

Under my tightening fingers my wife's slender throat constricting.

In the aquarium the sea otters are asleep and drifting in 

Lazy circles, holding paws so they don't drift apart.

Truth is a slippery thing, and we'd stopped holding on long ago.

You don't know the whole story.