Jane Doe

They closed the road through the woods today.
Yellow police ribbons flutter like butterflies
in the late afternoon breeze. Gawkers mass 
beside TV crews, hush as the body is borne out.

Still dressed in her mary jane best shoes,
scarred legs plump with childhood, the bushes
had snatched her party hat as easily as the killer
had taken her, a fox stealing a chick,
strayed too far from its roost.

Semen soaked panties, cigarette burns on her body,
flesh crammed under stubbed, broken nails,
her body was still cooling when stumbled upon.

What had she thought when, finally, he killed her?
Were her last words a cry, no, a screech 
for her absent mother, or did she call 
to a passing blackbird, beg it to bear her 
with it into the trembling and weeping skies. 

Pris Campbell
©2004


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