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| Members of the extended Anderson and Saincome families, with James Lee DiMaggio (right) are seen in this June 2011 photo provided to the AP by Andrea Saincome. James Lee DiMaggio was killed after being sought in the abduction of Hannah Anderson (reclining). Ethan Anderson (on floor, left) was found killed along with his mother. Source: New York Daily News. |
My uncle leans forward on the couch,
the news flashing across the screen.
A cop for over twenty years,
his own son a murderer -
lust, anger, drugs, the boy’s undoing.
The reports read Dead... and Alive,
but I’ve seen the ones who make it
the victims’ and murderer’s families,
what they had before,
what they thought they had,
all some distorted, unobtainable past.
My uncle’s son, caught, arrested,
locked up, then let go,
walks the streets somewhere,
neither man nor ghost,
dead or alive.
His victims - one deceased, one rescued -
nothing more than archived captions,
some story that passed away,
when the next one and the next one
and the very next one
came to life.
Kristina England resides in Worcester, Massachusetts. Her poetry and fiction is published or forthcoming in Decades Review, Gargoyle, Linguistic Erosion, The Story Shack, and other journals.