The arrangement.

Cold and calculated
he lived his life
similar to setting the table.
He didn’t know
what presided over him
but it was the President’s day
and so he shot him.
It was the arrangement
of the deranged.
.

Reviews

[R.E. Ray]

Andrew, when I read this poem, I immediately thought about John Hinckley, Jr. (shot President Reagan) and John Wilkes Booth (assassinated Abraham Lincoln). There are more, but their personalities and stories align with the derangement you've described here. Of course, many others have been harmed, shot or died at the hands of other deranged human beings. You've certainly captured the coldness here, and the brevity makes its own point.

[andrew mitchell]

THanks Robert, I wrote it in mind of those presidents who have fallen and how John Lennon died.