Joan's poems

We danced opposite each other in the ring.
The performance was excellent.
The audience quite silent.
We knew each other so well.
Every movement was countered with wild love.
With cold hate.
The audience was numb.
Then suddenly, I took out my knife,
Maybe he saw it for an instant, that I was a traitor,
I forced it in his neck,
There was a moment of stillness,
I watched him fall.
Then I was no longer there,
My tremendous action had carried me away,
The shrieks of the crowd were faint,
I was floating with my own lightness and freedom.
I walked past the praise -
For so many years this beast had held me down in that
ring, with that audience, or another,
But always the same beast.
Now I had beaten him,
Now I was rid of him forever.
In that haze, I dreamt of my new freedom.

The authorities gave him a great funeral because he had
Been the strongest and had defied all for many years.
The whole town turned out in their best.
The coffin was piled high with flowers from all over the
world and I was the star performer, playing my part as I
should - a victor with calm respect.

At the grave I stood with a gathered few,
They covered over the earth and I left free.
I travelled for many miles until I found virgin land,
There I stopped with pleasure and sat down with the
beauty and decided that was where I would start my life.
Here was everything for a new community.
I was eager to begin.
I looked up to the sky,
There were the evening's first dark clouds,
But they were like thunder inside me.
And I took out my knife and forced it into my heart
And wondered
If the beast and I would live another life.

Joan Mac Dougall