The Gallows
I envied the crowd, before which I stood
charged with refusing to bow my head.
Of the crime I was guilty, so guilty I pled,
to seek forgiveness would do no good.
The gallows gleamed of death stains on wood.
I scanned the crowd while my verdict was read:
“You are to be hung by the neck until dead.”
Then the man approached with the hood.
The hood took me from the light to the shadows.
My bravery escaped me as I heard my mother:
“He’s being killed for pride, not even for violence.”
I screamed to the crowd: “save me from the gallows!”
They hung me. I died. They called on another.
The crowd looked on in hunger and silence.
1 comment:
I love the lines "The crowd looked on in hunger and silence", "The hood took me from the light to the shadows", "The gallows gleamed of death stains on wood" for their dark and potent imagery and the creativity with which you explore the idea of death through multiple perspectives i.e. death as a stain, the hunger and silence of death, and the hood as death.
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