A Tale of Two Cities

Ronald Colman,

all his life debauched and aimless,

stands clear-eyed and heroic

bound for the guillotine

in this, his finest hour.

White shirt open at the throat

he comforts the frightened, trusting blonde

as they ride together in the rocking tumbrel

through screaming streets of sewer stink

and raw tobacco spittle,

inching past the legless beggar

past the old vindictive bitch who watches

shaking her woman ruins with loony laughter.

Then, from that carnival of popcorn, hamburgers and beer

comes the jeering and cries of the cloven-hoofed crowd

demanding his head on a platter

demanding tomato blood and giblet broth

screaming for the surprising yellow root of his being.

It is there in the sweet iambics of the afternoon

that Ronald Colman, unbuttoner of dresses,

loosener of tresses,

dreamer . . . drinker of burgundy . . .

ascends the platform steps.

The guillotine is a shadow of its timbers.

And the lethal blade,

the basket for the noble heads,

the authorities so be-business-suited stern.

Even the executioner a man of hat, cravat and gloves

while Ronald Colman, doomed but human,

looks up at the tumbling cotton clouds

looks down at the cobblestone people

looks far off at the rubber hills

beyond the fields of yesterday.

And it's then, in this best times

in this worst of times

that he acts out his paltry destiny

of choosing death to marriage,

rambling on like some converted drunk

about this is the best thing he has ever done,

kneeling at last before the preposterous guillotine

that breaks him down to basic chemicals

and frees him from the tumult of his mind

while gradually a choir of sound-track voices

blends him with the breeze.