the art & writing of

What do I say to him who’s within hours of being injected to his death?

I didn’t know, but I kept going.  That stop at the Family Dollar Store:  a psychological break, a time out.  I bought a coin purse.  A contrived act of normalcy on a surreal drive.   

It was chilly, it was late, it was at the end of the highway, where the road ends and  the gravel  begins.   The prison: an ex-plantation at the crook in the Mississippi  River. 

Walk into the death house.  Hug him goodbye, don’t cry,  don’t break down and cry.   Be out at the front gate  for him.  

But mostly it was for her.  Allyson had told me one time of ‘the gift of presence’.   She’d be there, she was there --  her gift to him -- as his eyes closed.   She finished the 23rd psalm, just her now, through the glass.

She walked through the front gate and crumpled in the hug.

She is a mighty warrior, wielding her love, waging her compassion at  just minutes after midnight.  

This story accompanies, via a Note Board, my art piece

 GOING TO AN EXECTUION.

 36” tall x  48” wide

mixed media: wood, paint, engraving on a wooden pallet

completed  9/09