Suddenly, Last Summer

Inspired by the Tennessee Williams play of the same name. (This one is longer, making up for the briefness of last week's piece.)


She screamed-
she screamed so loud the earth shook.
But no one heard her;
not one solitary look

toward her pained, contorted face.
They're consumed in their kill.
Her heart an empty space
as she watches, and her cries fill

the humid summer sky.
No one will believe her
when she tries to tell them why
the young man had to leave her.

So she locked it up inside
and now she can't remember.
Her spirit's well has dried,
her soul's become December

morning frost.
No one understands her.
The memories she's lost
hold the painful, bloody answer

to the questions they have asked.
But she contests to tell them
the truth, which she has masked
with the lies that she will tell them

in her desperate attempt
to bury what she's seen.
Her contrived, yet plain, contempt
labeled only as obscene.

She's cornered now-
sedated, forced to speak
of what she found
atop that mountain peak.

They devoured him.
Or, to her it seemed that way.
They took her sound mind with them
when they sucked his soul away.

The world they knew had ended
to the beat of one lone drummer.
Her insanity, distended
suddenly. So suddenly, yes... Suddenly, last summer.