kagablog

This is not a poem about

Ted Bundy

Well not exactly

Though history will record

That at precisely 7:16

In the morning on

January 15, 1988

Ted Bundy made

His final peace

If mass killers can ever

Be said to find peace

After a night of crying

And praying

Bundy was strapped into

The Death chamber

To be executed for his sins

One has to wonder what

Went on inside his head

As they strapped his chest

Arms and legs to the wooden chair

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His eyes searching the window

For signs of a familiar face

While seeming to nod at those

He recognized

Including the man who had

Prosecuted him

As his lips moved in a faint smile

Making one wonder what

He was thinking those last moments

With his head bowed as if in meditation

His skull glistening where an ointment

Had been applied to enhance the

Work of the loving electrodes

When asked if he had any last words

Bundy hesitated and said

In a quivering voice:

“Give my love

To my family and friends.”

With these last words

The guards pulled a thick

Strap across his mouth and chin

Bolting the metal skullcap firmly
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Into place

It’s heavy black veil falling over

His face

And with a prearranged signal

An anonymous State executioner

Pushed the button sending two-

Thousand volts of electricity

Surging through the wires causing

Bundy’s body to tense into a clench

As a tiny puff of smoke lifted

From one leg

A minute or so later which must

Have seemed like an eternity

A paramedic opened Bundy’s blue

Prison shirt and listened

For a heart beat while

A doctor aimed a small light

Into his still eyes

At 7:16 a.m.

Theodore Robert Bundy

Was officially pronounced

Dead.
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But the real story lay across

The dewy grass of a cow pasture

Where five hundred people

Had gathered to cheer the execution

When word came that Ted Bundy

Was dead

The mass of humanity began chanting

BURN BUNDY, BURN

While others sang or hugged or banged

On frying pans they had brought

For the occasion

It was clear for the moment

That everyone was having a good time

And that society had extracted

Its just due

But then this isn’t a poem about

Ted Bundy

Well, not exactly

For history will record

That as a civilized nation

We have burned people

Chained them up to starve

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Or be eaten by vultures

Castrated them gutted them

Torn them into pieces and

Even crucified them

And history tells us that

One man in New Orleans was

Nailed into a wooden box and

Sawed in half

And hanging is still a favorite

Sport in many states

Perhaps a hold-over from the

Good old frontier days

And the state of Utah offers the

Option of a firing squad

So it seems only natural as time passed

That a man named Edison would come along

To invent the electric chair

Which was sold as a more kindly

State of death

Only Rubert Webber the first man

To be executed in it

Might have disagreed

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It being reported Rubert refused

To die quietly or quickly

The first 2000 volts of electricity

Merely singing his skin

Witnesses said the sight

Of his scorched body strapped

To that chair bleeding from the

Face and body and twitching and all

Made the sheriff sick causing him

To vomit on himself

So being inventive as Americans are

Along came Hap Travis from Eaton

Metal Works in Denver

To develop the patent

To the gas chamber

The warden perhaps remembering

Poor Rubert Weber and not the

Kind of man to vomit on himself

Decided the first creature to die

Would be a small reddish brown pig

Both nameless and terrified

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The new $5,000 death machine

Arrived by rail and barge

And the pig just happened

To be in the wrong place

At the right time

The warden said to be

A hard old jailer could

Nevertheless not bring him self

To watch that day in 1938 when

Guards from the prison farmyard

Grabbed the elusive pig carrying

Him in their arms to the

Two-ton steel and glass monstrosity

Locking the victim into a cage

And strapping it to the execution chair

Sealing the chamber tight

As the cyanide tablets dropped

Into a vat of acid

It’s said that when the first fumes

Hit the pigs nostrils

The animal let out an unearthly squeal

Straining its snout between the bars

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Of the cage as it gasped for air.

The pig died straining away

From the choking fumes

Dashing its head against the

Unbending will of steel

Fighting with all its strength

Those last few dreadful seconds

Witnesses watched in horror

At this new human method of execution

That Adolph Hitler would later use

With loving care on the Jews

And lets not forget Aaron Mitchell

A poor black man from Mississippi

Who was dragged screaming from his cell

One April morning in 1967

So mad with fear that he slashed

His arm with a razor blade

Spending his last 24 hours

Standing naked in a crucified position

Proclaiming himself to be the

Second Coming of Jesus

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Now that’s what you call

Putting on a real show

And we’ll never know if

Lenderess Riley found it

Humane or not

What history does record is that

He too was dragged to the gas chamber

Screaming and filled with terror

Much like the reddish brown pig

Before him

And in the first recorded case

Of female equality

Barbara Graham became the first woman

Put to death by the state of California

Where it’s said a prison guard

Told her death would come easier

If she took a deep breath

And Slowly counted to ten

To which it is said she replied

“How in the hell would you know.”?

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The fact that many people

Even today consider her innocent

Of the crime for which she was convicted

Did not keep the show from going on

But being the humane race we are

We keep improving on the methods until

Today lethal injection has become the

Popular means for legalized murder

Despite the fact that in Texas

It took a half-hour to find

The vein of a junkie who didn’t

Die quickly at all

And in another recorded case

Of a messy execution

It took more than an hour before

The victim died

So messy was the execution

The authorities had to pull the

Curtain of the viewing room

So as not to make the witnesses sick

And the state of Florida

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Took great pride in “Old Smoky”
(A three-legged oaken seat)

Built by prisoners at Florida

State Prison in 1923)

To administer the tried and true

Two Thousand volt current lovingly applied

To 225 convicted criminals the

Most memorable taking place in March 1997

To dispatch Pedro Medina

A 39-year-old Cuban immigrant

To his maker

Pedro was strapped into the chair

At 7:10 a.m. and what happened

After this is public record

As something went wrong

With flames leaping from the

Masked head of the convicted murderer

So much smoke filling the

Death Chamber that an outside window

Had to be opened

Not that this was Florida’s

First botched execution

Old Smoky had to be unplugged

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For several months earlier in 1990

After smoke and flames were seen

Near the head of another

Convicted murderer during

An excruciating electrocution

In which three jolts of current were

Administered over a four minute period

Florida officials said Mediana’death

Was quicker even if more spectacular

Which seems at odds with the

State attorney general

Who said shortly after the execution:

“People who commit murder

Had better not do it in Florida

Because we may have a problem

With our electric chair”

This from an elected official

Of a State who can’t even

Get its voting machine to work right

And an enlightened Florida lawmaker

24 hours later introduced legislation

Suggesting the guillotine
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As a more humane method of execution.

And the state of Utah

Perhaps not wanting to be out done

Offers a wide variety of choices:

The electric chair the gas chamber

Lethal injection the firing squad

And yes the guillotine

The debate on whether Capital

Punishment is a determent

Has been going on for over a century

And the only thing we know for sure

Is what history tells us

That in the last century

There have been at least thirty

Californians convicted of murders

They didn’t commit

This according to a study conducted

By Tufts University

And this same study tells us that over

Three-hundred-and-fifty similar mistakes

Have been made nation-wide

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Though we hear little If anything

About such things unless

The condemned men are men of the

Privileged class

Thirty California convicts

Lucky enough to have won

Their freedom

But it took anywhere from

One to twenty-five years

To do so

Lucky enough to be vindicated

Luckier still to have lived

Long enough to be vindicated

And the Governor of the

State of Illinois suspended

All executions after it was revealed

A number of condemned men had been

Wrongfully sentenced to die

And history tells us that in the

19th Century in England

They held public hangings

To discourage pick-pocketing

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Only to find this crime

Increased during the hangings

Which would seem to lend credence

To those who claim Capital Punishment

Does not deter crime

But public executions have been

Public sport ever since the

Romans introduced the Christians

To the lions or Pontius Pilot

Gave in to the mob

So it’s no surprise that the

Government and the Courts invited the

Families of the victims of the

Oklahoma bombing to watch the execution

Of Timothy McVeigh on closed circuit TV

And though no tickets were sold to the event

You can be sure there was a good time had

For those who haven’t forgotten the

Ted Bundy Show

For like they say in Hollywood the

Show must go on