Hillbilly Justice
Twinkling lights. Stars all around.
Yet, here I am, prison bound.
For a crime that I did not do.
I couldn’t do such a thing to you.
The judge said “guilty” in a make believe trial.
Said I would be put away for a long while.
Someone shot and killed you.
That was something I wouldn’t do.
I loved you with all my heart.
I thought we would never part.
There is no justice in this hillbilly town.
I was an outsider, I soon found.
Yet, I loved you. It was my fate.
You worked at the diner where I ate.
You served me my breakfast plate.
You said you hoped I liked the steak.
We started talking and I asked you out.
You accepted. I wanted to shout.
After a few dates, we were a number.
Locals wanted to put us under.
They didn’t take to any strangers.
Said I wasn’t born in a manger.
I came over to pick you up.
In your hand was a coffee cup.
You were dead on the floor.
A gun was lying near the door.
I grabbed it up and looked around.
That is the way I was found.
Neighbors heard the shot . Came to see.
What they found was only me.
They saw the gun in my hand.
I was a stranger in their land.
They wouldn’t believe my story.
The gun matched the bullet in Lori.
My finger prints, of course, were on it.
So goes the story of my sonnet.
I’m going to die in the state prison.
Every one said “They wouldn’t miss him.”
A stranger in a hillbilly town has no chance.
He’d be better off to not find romance.
A backwoods lawyer isn’t worth his weight.
Which was considerable, at my trial date.
Justice is a word with little meaning.
When it comes to keeping me from swinging.
——————————R. W. Johnson—–(2016)