I Never Killed Anyone

February 4, 2014 at 7:04 pm · Filed under Bad Stuff, Crazy stuff, Dark Side, Mostly fiction, My novels, Poems, Shelter - the novel, Stories, The Devil's Dust ·Tagged adult situations, Austin Texas, burlap, crime novel, fiction, Free write Friday, hard core, Kellie Elmore, not for the timid, pearls, Shelter, The Devil's Dust, train, vertigo

I wrote this in story form a few days ago for Kellie Elmore’s Free Write Friday, and knew then it would have to be converted to poem form for dVerse Poets Pub’s Open Link Night #131. Enjoy!

I Never Killed Anyone

 

Head resting on a burlap sack of feed

Cheeks crisp from the cold

Seeping through unseen cracks

In the gently rocking boxcar

I slept fitfully

Spinning in and out of dreams

Like a man on a ledge

 

My coat—dirty and worn

Kept my body warm

While faded jeans

Saved my legs from freezing

Expensive walking shoes

Full of holes and slick on the bottom

From too many miles to count

Did nothing but magnify the cold

My feet felt like blocks of ice

 

Vertigo dreams were soundless

Except for the clacking of wheels

And creaking boxcars

And in the waking moments of the spin

I wondered if the movies in my mind

Were fiction or true crime

Probably some of both

 

I’d written novels… a lifetime ago

One full of drugs, sex, killing and rock and roll

The other about two homeless men

Who went on a crime spree

One winter in Austin, Texas

Thinking a warm jail cell

Better than a frigid concrete bed

It was cold as hell in Austin that winter

I know… I was there.

 

A black and white scene

Flashed across the screen of my dream

The woman’s eyes bulging

Mouth open in a silent scream

as rough, calloused hands choked her life away

A string of pearls breaking

 And as they floated to the floor

Of the parking garage

A scream—shrill and grating

 

The squeal of the train’s brakes

Spun me back to semi-awake

And as I lay there shivering

My wife’s words—God rest her soul

After reading that scene

“Honey, they say writers write about

What they know about

 This scares me.”

My answer

With a no-extra-charge smile

“I never killed anyone.”

 

Copyright © 2014 C Mashburn

If you’d like to check out my novels (I really did write two of them about 14 years ago) you can see and/or purchase them on Amazon. The Devil’s Dust and Shelter. Autographed copies are also available at Texas Trading Post (a wonderful on-line store that sells EVERYTHING Texas!).

The Devil’s Dust

The soul of man seethes wicked

Cold sweat reeks of evil lust

Blood runs hot and thin

When spiked with the devil’s dust

Copyright © 2013 C Mashburn

ALSO! Be sure and check out Kellie’s great books of poetry. She is, without doubt, one of the most talented poets of our time! Magic in the Backyard

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