By Rob McKinnon

 Trigger warning: sexual abuse, hanging references

(At age 21, Glen Sabre Valance was the last person to be hung in South Australia on 24 November 1964).

Is it quiet now?

Under the carefully cut lawn

between the old gaol walls

watching the hanging tower

where you took your last breath.

Is it quiet now?

Under your black initials

on the inner red bricks

with only the ghosts of the others

that lie there too for chat.

Is it quiet now?

Because your mother can’t burn your hand

on the hot cast iron stove,

push your face through the glass window

or hold that knife to your young throat.

Is it quiet now?

Where they can’t touch you anymore

as they held you down

in the boy’s home and orphanage

after she gave you away.

Is it quiet now?

Far from the Bordertown bedroom

where you shot him as he slept

then raped her while she screamed

next to her husband’s dead body.

Is it quiet now?

Since they led you from your cell

put the hood over your red hair

and ask you for your last words

as someone said a prayer.

Is it quiet now?

Did the shame go away

and the “bad thoughts” stop

when the somber siren wailed

to signal you were dead?