I Know You’re Still Smiling, You Can’t Help It by Fletcher Young

I’m not sure that anyone sane mourns you.
Not the people of the city,
or the commissioner and his wife,
or Angel Rojas, or the oracle, or Ra’s al Ghul,
but I know John Crane does, and Harley,
and I know I do.

I’ll never forget the morning
when Alfred walked up to the table
where I ate steak and eggs
with a side of wheat toast,
and he laid down a fresh Gotham Globe.
I fell limp like a neglected sock monkey
when I saw the day’s headline:
The Joker Laughs His Last Laugh,
with a drab photograph of you underneath
lying on a cot in a cell in Arkham
with your hands over your stomach, still smiling.

It’s strange when reality doesn’t seem real.

Such a disrespectful headline.
I couldn’t even read the rest of the article.
I was told you “died peacefully in your sleep,”
but I know nothing came peacefully for you,
as nothing comes peacefully for me.
We canceled each other out, you and I.

I’ve tried to recall how many times I’ve looked
into those wickedly somber eyes,
the eyes which stayed lit only to draw me to you,
the eyes which carefully calculated and carried out
audacious atrocities which wrote legends
that terrify even the most hardened criminals,
the eyes that I saw myself in.

I crave chaos as much as you did,
but now, the streets are quiet,
and there is no one to chase but petty thieves
whose crimes aren’t worth the gasoline
that I’ve wasted to find them.
So I’ve sordidly hung the suit in the cave
which sees neither light of day nor dark of night,
because all of the villains once described as super
no longer have anyone left to outdo.

Fletcher Young was born in Southwest Michigan, where he lived for 25 years.  He moved to Texas in 2010 to pursue a warmer climate and gain new inspiration.  Fletcher has poetry and fiction that will be appearing in Haunted Waters Press, Jack of No Trades Productions, and Circus of the Damed.  His hobbies include running, writing screenplays and training his Australian shepherd.