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Civilized Dogs |
You tell every gory detail
Your eyes flare
Waiting for the shock to hit me
You lean close
The story you tell impels you toward me
You conclude with outrage, horror, disbelief
But your eyes say otherwise
You’ve seen it before, you want more
That moment of death
You want me to feel
For your vicarious thrill
You’re a civilized man
Not a killer
Telling the murder tale is your intimacy
You are hungry for the moment of death
A delicacy for which you’ve developed a passion
When it’s in season, you cannot hide your obsession
Like a dog after that first taste, you crave blood
With an addict’s certainty, you would swear your behavior is normal
Antithesis of the loathsome criminal
Whose tale you impart
As your carnivorous eyes monitor my heart
For the instant of recognition of death’s descent
A little girl
Reverence in your voice for the sanctity of this small being
Left by the side of the road
Anguish in your face at this desolate end
Raped and murdered
You let your breath mingle with mine
In that mingling, are you thrusting your penis into my too young too small vagina? Is your too large organ ripping me apart? Is blood trailing the inside of my leg? I feel your breath, hot and acrid in my mouth.
Where does this evil hide? You cry.
Are you crushing my slender jaw in your ogre palms?
Are you slitting my unsexed belly with your fishing knife?
You exhale into my nostrils.
How long can we hide our shame at this young girl’s fame?
Brief. Insane. You exclaim.
Do you hear my skull crack against the inside of the trunk as you slam the brakes?
Do you marvel just for a second at the featherweight of my limp body?
Your chest expands and contracts to the rhythm of mine.
Treacherous terrain. The mind of this mad man. You warn.
Do you giggle at how easy it is to rape and murder and throw away the little girl?
I can see the laughter in your eyes
Right behind the hunger
Demanding a vicarious thrill
What is wrong with me that I do not deliver that death moment for you to savor?
You want to see the revulsion, the terror, the fear
That any civilized person would feel.
My civilization knows this story
A little girl
I don’t know if she could talk
Full of life
I don’t recall if she could yet walk
Angel’s laughter
I don’t remember the precise moment
when I raped and murdered and threw away the little girl.
Now and then I catch myself
honoring dead girls, forgetting the living.
Sometimes I catch myself
mourning tragic ends to fragile beauty, refusing to nurture frail beginnings
Often I catch myself
thrusting the column of my power, heedless of the destruction
Too often I catch myself
sacrificing what is precious to quell my fear of possibility
Frequently I listen to young girls’ death screams reverberating like a national anthem
Always I marvel at how easy it is to murder hope and live this death.
I recognize the hunger in your eyes.
I know the laughter sparkling behind your gory tale.
Our dogs run in the same pack, lusting for the sweet scent of young blood.
copyright 2002
Melissa
Fischer |
