The Wall
Winnie, wild-eyed, went insane
and sang “Happy Birthday” in the rain,
while she washed away her bloody pain.
Now all day long she sings that song,
she sings it loud, she sings it strong,
walled in where she does not belong.
For not unlike her maddened mind,
her bony body’s been confined
by stone walls, stark, en-wrapping ‘round,
damp, daunting, dark, with barbs that bound
sad souls inside asylum ground,
where Winnie’s soul is seldom found.
There, locked inside her room, she’ll sway,
and sing all night and through the day,
while in the courtyard children play,
singing: “rings run round the rosie,
our pockets are so cozy,
pussy cats, kitchen rats, all fall down.”
Some are deemed dangerous, some mentally lazy,
everyone there is presumed crazy.
Some are savants, sullen and sad,
with brilliant minds misjudged as bad …
Nurse Nancy checks on Winnie when it’s time to go to bed.
She doesn’t trust the doctors who said Winnie was brain dead.
“I know that you’re still there inside, the feckless doctors fear it.
Oh Winnie, Winnie, I just know that I can find your spirit,”
while Winnie winks a smile at her, and never lets her near it.
“I knew you when your father lived and taught you to chop wood.
You took care of your widowed Mom, you did all that you could.
They taught you to have faith in God, and know what’s right from wrong.
It pains me when I hear you stuck inside that birthday song.”
But Winnie doesn’t hear because her mind has long since wandered,
outside stone walls of woefulness where human hopes are squandered.
Wand’ring sometimes in the city,
grinning wide she sings her ditty,
watching people pass with pity.
So pointlessly they seem to plod
like ants, as in a trance they trod,
which Winnie thinks is, oddly, odd.
We wander far when wand’ring lonely,
while Winnie’s thoughts will wander only
to birthday gifts her mother gave,
so soon before she saw her grave:
Ten happy candles lovely lit,
blown out with special birthday spit,
now laughs when oft’ she thinks of it,
when wider, wider, grows her grin,
which won’t recall that savage sin,
when pastor peered upon his flock
with beastly thoughts no prayer would block,
and watched poor Winnie weep in shock:
“Winnie, Winnie, orphan Winnie, at your mother’s grave, don’t cry.
Take my hand and I will take you to my bed where tears will dry.”
Still staring down in disbelief,
her heart so heavy, gripped with grief,
but craving respite and relief.
Alone with no means of subsistence,
she scarcely offered up resistance,
as pastor pleaded with persistence.
Wee Winnie was a wide-eyed wonder,
fresh fodder for the pastor’s plunder,
while heaven cried with cracks of thunder.
Foundations of her faith were shaken,
when her sweet innocence was taken,
but pastor never will awaken.
For when this demon deeply slept,
that last time Winnie ever wept,
with will of steel in stealth she stepped,
so slowly, slowly, slowly.
This little lamb could not be kept,
she found a fire axe and crept
upon the pastor as he slept,
so lowly, lowly, lowly.
Then right was wrong and wrong was right,
she swung the axe with all her might.
Then wrong was right and right was wrong,
she sobbing sang her somber song.
Then dashed out in the driving rain
to try to wash away the stain,
which only amplified her pain.
Flash lightning lit the nighttime scene,
revealing all that was obscene --
the bloody pain of this pre-teen.
Fate, be not foul, though far from fair,
no mortal child should have to bear
such depth of pain, such deep despair.
But Winnie's will was under-rated,
as pastor found when he was sated,
sober, and emasculated.
“There’s no time now to be remorseful,
now is the time to be resourceful.
To solve this problem of my pain,
I’ll build a wall inside my brain.
And if my thoughts should ever reach it,
I’ll fix things so they’ll never breach it.”
And so, to exorcise her soul from sadness,
and banish all that bastard badness,
she solipsized her song of gladness –
sweet birthday song of glowing gladness—
then modified her mind to madness:
Nothing further she’d remember,
nothing of that sad September,
nor the pastor she’d dismember …
So jealous of her haunted ease,
asylum mates will taunt and tease
with childish chants into the breeze:
“Winnie, Winnie what a shame,
pastor’s dead and you’re to blame!”
While Winnie, thinking it a game,
sings “Happy Birthday!” all the same.
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