Julianna’s Death 1791

The Boutilier Murders


Morning is silver soft

The ocean weeps
Its thin veil sweeps in
A heavy shroud over
the granite shore boulders
Creeps up the bank
Breaks on balsam fir and birch
Blesses the wild alders

Stifle the ocean's quiet moan
Let nothing breathe

Fingers sift cinders
Night's harsh breath
Charred logs
broken by flame
This strange dance
of sacrificial death
cracked open by one
fierce stroke of
the neighbour's iron pivee

Last night's pyre
yields up its bodies
Cross-piled in the ashes
Anointed by black blood
A girl... The old man...
And at last... underneath
cradling them both
Julianna

Spirit sliced from
her plump German flesh
by one wild blow
thrown in anger by
the Boutiliers' hatchet

Far from her Vaterland birth

Earth
becomes
flesh
becomes
earth

The ocean roars and weeps
Hide... Oh hide your soft secrets

With reverent fear
stiff arthritic fingers
brush back a thick
layer of ash

The ocean cleaves and rolls
Protect... Oh protect these savaged souls

Unseen, the Unknown God
gets up from His throne
In one swift sweep scoops
Julianna's breath
off the ash heap

Cleanses the dust
Transforms it in a flash
to mirth-filled dancing bone

Forgiven... Scrubbed... Reborn
She runs safely home


NOTES: The night had been thick. The sea rolled a great deal.
Two months later, the brothers were hanged at the scene of the murder.