Diane Elayne Dees

Visiting Your Remains

You always sat slumped in the blue wing chair,
describing to me the terrible pain,
the relentless throbbing in your head;
hours and weeks and years of talking;
you next to the miniature Chinese costumes
on the narrow table under the clock.

Sometimes you slept through your alarm clock
and left me in silence in my overstuffed chair,
to contemplate the delicate red and gold costumes
and meditate on the river of pain
that flowed through your obsessive talking--
the polluted visions that flooded your head.

You'd once fired a bullet into your head
but had lived, just to watch the clock
mark the moments as your life slipped by, talking
for 45 minutes in a straight-backed chair
about the loss, the rage, the endless pain--
but how you loved this room, and the Chinese costumes.

Black jeans and biker jacket, your rebel costume;
Confederate flag belt buckle, scar across your head—
that precarious highway on the map of your pain.
For years we sat facing the unyielding clock,
each of us trapped in an elegant chair.
You said that it helped you so much, all this talking.

Outside the door, we could hear people talking,
suburbanites dressed in identical costumes,
while you sat, apart from them all, in that chair,
preparing yourself for the hours ahead--
away from my face and this room and the clock;
you said you had learned how to deal with the pain.

Then a shotgun blast—a split second of pain
for you, and now there will be no more talking.
But on Thursdays, I still have to look at the clock
by the narrow table with the miniature costumes.
I go over and over the years in my head,
and the things that I said from my overstuffed chair.

Someone else now sits straight in the blue wing chair,
talking of pain with the clock overhead,
and never once noticing the little Chinese costumes.

Still—Opening Scene, The Letter

Leslie Crosbie grips the smoking pistol,
her eyes dead set on the dying man;
a portrait of controlled despair,
her lips pursed shut, her secret safe.

Her eyes dead set on the dying man:
for many years he was her slave.
Her lips pursed shut, her secret safe,
if she can't have him, no one can.

For many years he was her slave,
her own husband suspecting nothing.
If she can't have him, no one can,
not the wife he hides away,

her own husband suspecting nothing.
Leslie believes that he loves her,
not the wife he hides away,
ashamed of the color of her skin.

Though Leslie believes that he loves her;
it is his mysterious wife he loves.
Ashamed of the color of her skin,
he looks behind his shoulder always.

It is his mysterious wife he loves,
though he betrays her in every way.
He looks behind his shoulder, always
wondering when he'll be found out.

He betrays her in every way,
while she waits behind a beaded curtain,
wondering when he'll be found out.
She knows about Leslie Crosbie.

She waits behind a beaded curtain
for the time when she can reveal all
she knows about Leslie Crosbie.
She holds a letter that exposes truth,

for the time when she can reveal all
will be the time she emerges from behind the curtain.
She holds a letter that exposes truth.
She grasps a dagger that renders justice.

In time she emerges from behind the curtain,
a portrait of controlled despair;
she grasps a dagger that renders justice,
as Leslie Crosbie grips the smoking pistol.