POETRY COLLECTION

On a Rope, in Haste, for a Whim

There were no words with which to utter

Nor want, there left to talk

So he hung his head and stumbled forward

On the day of that fateful walk

Hands bound behind his back he walked

In a silence that cooled the blood

And his boots they left their final mark

In the ankle-deep slurried mud

They stood him by the swaying noose

And readied up the knot

Then slipped it over the condemned man’s head

And awaited the fatal drop

His sentence then was issued;

He hung his head and bowed

Then they checked the ropes, just one last time

And hushed the restless crowd

The calico sack now over his head

To conceal the grim face of death

That would soon come and haunt his corpse

And draw out his final breath

“Lord forgive this man, for all his wrongs,

Or to the Devil, do what thy will"

And they pulled the lever for release;

The floor dropped, and then was still

Below it, swaying, his body hung

Twitched once then moved no more

He was a remembrance for what life used to be

Until dropped from a wooden floor

A healthy man, a life, a soul

A human, discarded like waist

Was lost in the swirling mass of this world

And humanity's thoughtless haste

A human’s life was gone like that

And no more was thought of him

Innocent? Guilty? T’was one life gone

On a rope, in haste, for a whim