he courtroom was packed as the verdict was delivered
The quiet defendant sat paralysed in disbelief
Her hands would be severed, she would be hung and then burnt

I turned to console her but she was already being ushered away
Her life had never been an easy one
Forced to procreate like beasts in dark stables
She wept whenever she laid her head down to sleep

To escape would be her only refuge
From this trivial life she had been forced to lead
Her lover's empty promises
Drove her towards these drastic measures
Her timeline was ticking with the spring thaw quickly approaching
Aware that she would be whisked away with the free flowing currents

She had to react

The tiny witness who pointed her out
Giggles today as she walks towards the schoolhouse
But Angelique had no freedom ever since that gavel fell
The shovel full of coals is what persuaded the judge

At the gallows she stood before them
With quivering lips she begged for absolution
But when the hangman tripped the switch
Her body finally fell towards its fate
Afterwards the empty carcass was flunt upon the pyre
Her neighbors and comrades all watched as the hem of her skirt ignited
They all cheered with glee as the flames consumed her

Dragged out of bed in the dead of night
With their phones ringing pitilessly
Later at the station the droopy-eyed constables
Stared at their computer screens
Sleep-laden officers
Huddled over their coffees as they tried to decipher
The surreptitious low flying lights
Hovering off the coast of our shores

So faint yet blinding

A plane must have crashed
The survivors must be attempting to signal help
The coastguard was contacted
And the coordinates were delegated

They were appalled when they were informed
That nothing was in the water
A blank empty ocean was all that was found
And they were reprimanded and chastised

For you see Shag Harbour's visitors
Had already received their package
High above the earth trapped and drugged
A man was trapped to a cold table
Prodded and probed
With his vital organs laid out beside him
Tiny creatures were dissecting him

Awake but sedated he watched
As they tore through his sternum

While back down on earth everyone sat perplexed
Questioning their own interpretations of what they had witnessed
The tired policemen crawled back into their beds
Saddened and bewildered by what had been said

All the while inside the vessel
The man was still aware
As the vermin slowly reconstructed him
His liver and kidneys and lungs and heart
Were repositioned and motivated to restart

Drifting off as they stitched him up
Suction cup laced tentacles worked miraculously
At home the man awoke with a start
Clutching at his chest and removing his shirt to inspect
But nothing was revealed but clean white skin
Radiating palely in the cold early morning light

Shackled and confined within this tiny cell
I await punishment for a crime I did not commit
Flies and rats accompany me here

The bars gleam moist with condensation
As I sit throughout my last sunrise

This tiny island was called Admiral when I first arrived
Now it's overpopulated and infested

Framed for murder
Another red-skinned scapegoat
My hatred of diversity condemned me

The man they believed I killed
Was sitting at peace when he was shot in the back
His dining room table became his deathbed
Flimsy evidence supporting an airtight case
The murder weapon misplaced
Fallen coincidentally to the bottom of the lake

His wife glared at me in the courtroom
A devilish stare I will never forget
Her tear-streaked face radiated with a glint of hope
As the judge revealed his verdict

So now I wait as the sun slowly rises
Counting on my last hours
Pleading for forgiveness
Although I am guiltless

The time has now arrived they are standing outside my chamber
The noose has been set and the crowd has gathered

The noon sun blinds me as I approach the gallows
So much that I can't see my family weeping at the back of the square

Tied and bound with a burlap sack over my head
I can only hear what they are doing to me
The last thing I perceive is the gasp of the crowd
Just before the rope swings taut

Framed for murder
Another red skinned scapegoat
Left to hang
In another man's place
Framed for murder
Another red skinned scapegoat
Eternal red skinned scapegoat

The morning light shone across the surface
I had hoped Canoe Lake would be like this

The constant financial pressures
Were constricting my creativity

A black canvas stalked my nightmares
Night after night I had the same reoccurring vision
So I thought a therapeutic fishing expedition
Might help remedy the darkness which had been consuming me

But sadly it only brought my blackened revelations
To the next extremity

As I pushed off the dock
I basked and reclined
In the serenity

This was exactly what I needed seclusion and peace
But after a short while I was distracted
By a faint line of smoke rising in the distance

When I approached the two men by the fire
Quickly they turned and shuffled away
I was startled when the third one attacked me from behind

The deserters worked quickly carrying my lifeless body
Towards the water's edge

There I was laid to rest in my shallow watery grave
I sunk beneath the surface floating adrift amongst the logger's forgotten rotting stumps

My assailants walked away
Swaying ignominiously
Running from a life of violence
Brought them closer to it than they could have ever imagined

Now they are cursed to the life of the damned

A silent forty-two years
Nestled in the heart of Nova Scotia
Marooned in Digby's Sandy Cove
A legless man was found unconscious on the shore
When he later awoke in the home of a local fisherman
He obsessively muttered the same three words over and over again

The first was Jerome
He repeated it so much so that it was decided it must be his name
Colombo was the second
Perhaps the name of the ship that abandoned him
The mutiny he attempted to lead left him stranded

Cast off into the vast unknown
After a ruthless Captain inflicted his harsh naval judgment
By hacking off both of his legs just above the knee

The final word was Trieste
Was this the land that he dreamed of
As he screamed and moaned throughout his nights
Conceivably it was visions of loved ones severed and distorted
That motivated him to remain mute

Apart from these three words the man was soundless
He moved slowly during his enduring years
By scuffling forward on his hands and stumps

Canada's first melancholic welfare recipient
Died on April 12th 1912

Broken fragments of his past have emerged
But the truth was never unveiled
A stone marker is all that's left now
As a memory of this nation's amputated enigma

Prominent local aristocrats
Painted red throughout history
A fortune born out of sugar
Led the family to the social summit
The daughter of Montreal's fourth mayor
Laid silently at rest in her bed
As her son of twenty four years
Studied mercilessly in the adjacent room

As night settled darkness fell upon the Square Mile Mansion
Delirious thanks to her pain medication

Ada Maria Mill Repath
Unlocked the top drawer of her nightstand
And removed from it a fevered solution
But her flimsy faint grip allowed it to fall

Clattering to the floor

Once Clifford's focus was interrupted
He headed out in search of the racket
But when he entered his Mother's room
It was already splattered with her blood brains and bones

The aspiring med student resolved to seal his own fortune as well
The pressures of life had completely crippled him

Three days later they were already both six feet below
Rotting slowly as the populous' interest
Took flight as the rumours grew so did the mystery of it all

Sadly Sherbrooke Street was never quite the same
The Golden Square Mile was forever tainted
The gloom that engulfed their mansion
Still remains present today

Officer you have to believe me
I didn't kill my wife
Please settle down sir just start from the beginning
And tell us what happened to Sophie

Our baggage was packed tight the essentials were gathered and prepared
This was the Honeymoon trip we had been planning for months
Skinny-dipping in the hot springs of the Kootenay Rockies that was her dream
The earth moist beneath our boots crumbled as we set out that morning
Long eerie shadows stretched out and crawled towards us

A simple meal once camp had been set
Afterwards we curled together before the fire
As darkness settled the two of us became one
Our subtle moans leaked past the night and across the vast unknown plains

As our sweat dried we clung together and drifted off into sleep
A rustle in the distance startled me awake
I turned towards Sophie to initiate another round
Overtaken by her vulnerability

But the vacuous silence she emit puzzled me until I turned on the flashlight
All that was left of my wife was a bloodied upper torso torn and fragmented

That's when I first heard it, the ominous black beast
Howling and grunting just out of sight
Then nothing for a minute until the hairy creature attacked again
It had come back for what was left of Sophie

Shivering naked and caked with her blood
I drifted off as I waited for morning
I then awoke to you guys screaming
Please officer you have to believe me

Led to the family by the Lord
I had no choice but to overtake
The Mother's role
But that little one was always testing me
Allowing others to question my authority
She was guiding them towards a life of sin
I decided she could burn if she wanted to
But I wasn't going to let her take the others with her

I have removed the presence of evil twice before
My own blood impure

Was simply unacceptable a soft pillow sufficed
To smother little ones before the demons

Had their chance to escape

But this one was different
I have never seen the devil
Put up such a fight
We had tried to vanquish it
Once before
But sadly the host-body gave out
And set the parasite
Back on its course

It kept quiet for a few weeks after that
And she seemed calmer and more obedient
But as with all sicknesses

Subtle hints of the disease
Snuck up and reappeared

Before long she was back to her old ways
So we reinstated the hot iron and rod
But our late nights educating and reformatting
Were once again interrupted

But from this there was no return
Comatose in her bed
Before the presence finally left
A child died as two more grew within me

Her Father and I were arrested on the church steps
As we emerge with our fellow mourners
We have been paraded through the media ever since
But our silent ploy has been kept forever a secret
Since it left this world with us when we ascended