[Pinot Grij]

Curt is sputtering blood. Mutters and grunts. Barely clinging to life.
The streetlamp’s glow glints off a knife from a hand at the fringe of its light.
Curt’s body shape, oddly splayed, shudders with the trace of his winnowed breath
As the blaze of a cigarette hovers about the face of his assailant’s silhouette
Its gaze, a chilling threat. Its ill intent beset to finish this violent crime
As Curt’s mind flashes behind his eyelashes – perhaps for a final time.

Could it be the sugar-sweet Debbie? Curt’s bubbly wife?
Truthfully, these have been troubling times with the love of his life
She’d grown distant and cold. Her listlessness shown in subtle gestures
A marriage under pressure.. what once was tender crushed to embers
Her meddling mother. So testy and smug with her idle chatter:
How Curt could have a higher stature if he’d commit to climb the ladder
Her grumpy father. Such a bother. He called his daughter, so impassioned
He had wished very bad for her to marry Chad. The college rowing captain.
And so it happened. Their love eroded fast without warning
Debbie would “go out with her friends” and didn’t come back til the morning.
Those texts on her phone. Sent from Unknown:
No quaint conversation. Just dates, times and places.
Did Curt not see it coming? Her running away with an old love?
But was that added twist the catalyst for her to kill him in cold blood?

Or had it been his estranged pal, Steve. They had been great colleagues.
Listened to the same tracks from way back. Played in the same baseball league
But one night at a family dinner, Curt had wanted some answers
Steve was locked in the bathroom with his teen daughter, Samantha
Curt started and stammered, “Y-Y-You should be locked in the slammer!”
And beat his fist on the wall so hard he knocked off the plaster
Samantha screamed, “Dad, I’m seventeen, and I don’t need a lecture!
I’ll be in love with Steve forever! We were meant to be together!”
Curt was mean as ever as he told Steve, “Don’t fuck with my kids!”
Steve left, but not before he said, “You’ll pay for this, you son of a bitch!”

But what about Hector? The local rector. He couldn’t be ruled out.
Curt saw him in close range as his son Joe changed in the pool house.
He watched in perverted, silent glee as he lurked behind a tree
Curt emerged stridently and screamed, “Haven’t you heard of privacy!”
Hector cried wildly, “I’m just watching his children, since Christ isn’t here.
But if you insinuate impropriety unjustifiably, I can wave goodbye to my career!
Not in your wildest dreams is this what it seems! You may as well spit in my face!
Don’t play foolish games - I’ll know who to blame if this reaches my parishioner base!”
“Just leave,” Curt plainly demanded. So Hector escaped like a bandit.
But could this secret cause a priest to break the most sacred Commandment?

————————————————————

In the chill of the night. Curt was choking on blood. No hope was enough.
His murderer’s knife had stabbed a final jab - the coldest of thrusts.
Standing clearly in the streetlight - the assailant’s hood, he hurled it backwards
Now his identity was surely answered, it was fucking Bernie Sanders!
Sanders supports breaking up families and decreasing the age of consent
He sympathizes with NAMBLA and thinks boys should have relations with men
All these issues affected Curt, and so he grew spiteful and raucous
And had it known that he’d cast his vote for Clinton at the Iowa caucus!
So Sanders had offed him. Don't trust a socialist with truly ruthless methods.
I’m Hillary Clinton. Your next president. And I approve this message.