Frankenstein,
On Reflection
by
David Barber
The
mob tidies up the lab and leaves
in
a jostle of pitchforks and torches,
the
castle silhouetted by lightning.
The
mood as they make their way homewards
is
they misjudged Frankenstein’s efforts
to
dismantle these roaming monsters.
On deanimation nights there
is a whiff
of corruption and the spat of voltage
as each failed creature relinquishes
its
vital spark and stiffens into loss,
before
stitches can be carefully unpicked
and body parts returned to their coffins.
Nails black with
gravedirt, Igor tenderly
replaces the brain in an empty skull,
hoping the corpse he hoists on
the gallows
is
the hero who yanks a murderous blade
from
someone’s back and hides it for the years
it
takes until the knife becomes innocent.
Soon Frankenstein will unlearn his life’s
work,
his surgeon’s fingers losing their way
in the wet labyrinths of the body,
his parents teaching him forgetfulness
all through his dwindling childhood, erasing
day after each bright day, until the first.
The End
