Barnes_final


 

Copyright © 2011 by Christopher Barnes and Cultural Logic, ISSN 1097-3087 

(From) The Electric Chair Poems 
 

Christopher Barnes 
 
 
In The Heart Of The Electric Chair 
  
Spirited off the characters of ledgers, 
Your fable might be a rough-and-tumble clangour 
In steam-lapse teeters. 
  
This power-swell stun seat 
Won’t let you scarper; as you plunge, 
Unflinching journey’s end. 
  
A blood-curdling scream 
Flips round the corner.  
  
 
Multiple Shocks 
  
The brain as burger becomes tender 
Through the swelling grip of The State. 
Moods coil the heart. 
One switch shocked you blank. 
Hangmen as forewarned 
Are jettisoned – 
Release catches its illuminating pathway. 
  
Photos have actions.  Who’d strain for this 
Hard-line resolution?  Push button close-up?  
 
 
A Good Execution? 
  
The turnkey hoists the humdrum 
To excessive points of vigilance.  Pure white socks 
Tremble with milliampers – 
He quits dilemma’s horns 
For almost fathomless dilly-dallying. 
  
You’re not unique, a somebody 
Blindfolded in dark. 
At the extreme’s terminal fix, 
Perched, tightened in this guilt-cell shaker – 
Hang on for stone-dead volts to flash.