By Moristotle
[Editor’s Note: Originally published on December 26, 2012, in the Ask Wednesday slot for an interview. Yes, in those days I was actually doing a regular weekly interview.]
You knew it would happen sooner or later. We’d not have an interview back in time from any or our prospective interviewees.
I knew it would happen too. Fortunately, I had thought of an idea for a sestina that I wanted to try. And here it is [questions in italics]:
Tells us first, what was the crime, detective?
The crime was a baffling case of murder.
A man of sixty-nine was the victim,
Shot dead in his yard and not one witness
To the crime’d come forth, or hint of killer.
For two days, we didn’t have a suspect.
How did you identify a suspect?
I began what any book detective
Would to discover leads to a killer:
While forensics examined the murder
Scene, and my crew tried to find a witness,
I found out all I could about the victim.
What did you find regarding the victim?
His atheism hinted a suspect
Might be found, for lack of any witness,
By looking at people a detective
Could find who had motive for the murder.
Maybe one of them would be the killer.
It’s true, sometimes motive leads to killer.
In this town, the flagrance of our victim
In denying God could well spark murder.
Religious zealots would yield a suspect.
There were quite a few, so I, detective,
Asked around and came to find a witness
Who informed me, though he didn’t witness
The crime itself, that he’d heard some killer-
Talk against the dead man’s blog. "Detective,"
He told me, "possibly he was victim
Of a hate crime, and I myself suspect...."
He named three who might have done the murder.
So, did one of those three do the murder?
An affidavit signed by the witness
Led to tapping the three on his suspect
List, and in not many days the killer
Emerged – one who said God willed the victim
Dead! It’s the first time that this detective,
Looking into murder, knew a killer
To witness to God’s picking the victim!
We suspect there’ll be more. Thanks, detective.
| Copyright © 2017 by Moristotle |
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