powerful stormy colors --- cheap pornography in each act of violence -
disgust, magmatic forces drain in their constricting whirl weak wills to
destruction, night covers them together with time, still someone saw and
brought facts to the light that without names has made miseries of people a
common thread, a non linear escape of our compressed emotions
From: "Robin Hamilton" <[log in to unmask]>
> As the issue of "historical" poems has come up as a general issue, perhaps
> I'd better admit to one of my own attempts in this area.
>
> Robin
>
> NIGHTPIECE: LONDON, 1888
>
> In the shallow dark while the rain trickles down,
> A man in a tarnished frock-coat waits
> Hidden by the lamplight;
> (The lamp is gas - it sputters an incandescent flare
> Across his face, his coat. A dog shadows its desire
> Along the edge of the pavement: this is called atmosphere.)
>
> A hand thrust into the breast of the coat, in the hand
> A freshly-whetted butcher's knife, just
> Nine inches long;
> (The time is eighteen eighty-eight; the place is Whitechapel;
> The man is not yet notorious nor his acts
> Celebrated: this is called historical detail.)
>
> Along the road the dragging beat which signals
> The return home of a street girl who has turned
> Too many tricks that night;
> (The dog registers its presence with a quick, spastic dribble;
> The man does not shift; the girl draws her tiredness
> Closer to him: this prepares the climax.)
>
> The cast meets in a quick flurry of action for which
> You may write your own narrative: there is a
> Pornography of death ...
> (All we can say: the girl's identity is known;
> The man himself still rests anonymous; the dog
> Unrecognised by history.)
>
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