"Midnight shakes the memory as a madman shakes a dead geranium" - TS Eliot - Rhapsody on a windy night
Look out the window at midnight
As dusty wind blows down the street
See Mr Jones outside his house
With eyes that in the centre meet
He picks up a plant pot upside down
And shakes the dry earth out
Then retreats back through his open porch
Saying “I am sane without a doubt”
His daughter in the morning finds
Her geranium is dead
She does not blame her father
For he was fast asleep in bed
She throws it on the compost heap
Where she discovers with a shock
All the keys that have gone missing
From all their neighbours locks
She takes them in to show her mum
Who lies headless on the floor
Her stiff white finger pointing
To a note pinned on the door
It says that Mr Jones is mad
Completely round the bend
Why daddy chopped off mummy’s head
She does not comprehend
But as she leaves the bloodstained house
To find a neighbour she can trust
She sees her dad is standing on the roof
And screaming fit to bust:
“She made my life a misery!
She made me wish that I was dead!
So this morning with a carving knife
I cut off dear Susan’s head!”
