Ode To Fellow Bordenites by Tina Weidle
A hatchet on one side. An ax on the other.
The legend of Lizzie killing father and step mother.
So brilliant, so angry, did she make the plan?
To kill step mommy, and later kill again?
Or maybe she didn’t plan it that way at all…
And another murderer, waited in the hall.
And father who came home early that day.
Did the killer know it would be that way?
An ax they say, not knowing where it was from.
Nor where it went when the end had come.
So oddly it became, how the murders turned out.
Noone saw anything, and noone heard shouts.
Only minutes later, the maid heard a yelp.
Then the maid was sent for help.
Doctors, police, so many others too.
In and out of that house, and not a clue.
Lizzie got arrested, the town all a gasp.
When father came home Lizzie laughed.
She burned her dress, she told a lie!
Do not let her go, Lizzie must die!
The jury decided it was all no good,
There wasn’t enough proof, to prove Lizzie could.
People all around, in amazement they scoffed.
Feeling that Lizzie had just been let off.
And they also felt Lizzie did not do enough at all,
To find the real killers, they were appalled.
The whispers, and rudeness cut like a knife.
Would continue throughout the rest of her life.
So many stories would live, long after she’s gone.
And the legend of Lizzie will continue on.
The case wasn’t solved, and will live on forever.
In the hearts of Bordenites, and the case of Fall River.
Ode to Fellow Bordenites © 2002 Tina Weidle