On the day of our lord in 1647, the noble was taken away to the gallows at the field of Tyburn. There, he was to hang for his crimes. Not be put to the block like a man of nobility, but put to the gallows, for so great was his sin. Held in Newgate with a rope about him, nuns said they could see his evil glare glowing like embers within the recesses of his eyes and he smiled all the while, causing priests to flee. He is unrepentant. What crimes did he commit that are so far and great, many may wonder? Seven children murdered. 5 woman lay poisoned. 1 queen in her deathbed. Five fields in squalor. It must have been in conjunction with the devil himself. Such a chord with the evil one, the village peasants say, and now hes going to meet his hellish maker, for that's the price he'll pay.

Though he is unrepentant. On the cart to his hellfire, to the uproarious call,bound in ropes and chain like Lucifer, young and effervescent, glowing before his fall. What turned him, this noble of a mere 24 years, to these beast. He who lurks in cages, laughs at funerals pyres, and drinks oxen blood? It was that trip into the forest, the village elders say, he signed his name in the book of shadows and gave his soul away. We know, says the matrons, old souls bearing hens, we've seen him like the leaping jack, springing from the fen. As though the devil licked his heels, he runs to and from with flight, knocking on the village doors, and receding from our sight. He stole Alice! He stole Peter! Stole Lucian! Stole Madeline and Esther! Where he took them nobody knows, though there bones where bones, cut frightful blows.

His strings are pulled by Old Nick himself, the father of evil, maniacal elf. Heavens, he's dashing, screams the village girls, with flouncing hands and gingery curls. “He hath the power to assume that form”, says the village pastor -"the cunning deception from which all sin is born". As the carriage approaches the place of his death, the prince makes a struggle and catches his breath. The executioner laughs, to be rid of this fiend, the evil monster and felon, to a sight now unseen. "To ratland go you, or hades too, to baste forever into lucifers stew!"He laughs in delirium as the gallows is fastened, as seconds are passing.

Though he looks to the crowds, roaring with rage, like bestial creatures to break down the cage. "The monster! The murderer! Let him die on this day! Off now to the fires, by God shall you stay!"

Though a singular tear then falls to his cheek. As seconds are ticking by he is timid and weak. Raising his head to the crowd that goes, he glimpses a figure in burgundy robes. A scarlet figure that dons a great cape and feathered hat is standing in wait. The figure that summoned him to the forest so deep,on the night of St John with a promise to keep. Nodding his head he stands amid, smiling a smile-a conquest to sin.

For on the day of our lord in 1647, did a young noble hang for his crime. "I am innocent"he cries, yet is cannot be undone

Floor plummets beneath him by the last light of the sun.

The crowd roars approval, the fiend is now slain, a monster of humanity, never back again

Yet in the crowd glancing , achild looks the tips of his toes, and sees a limbering figure in burgundy robes.

"My garden is growing",the figure chants as he moves out of sight

Disappears laughing to the village.

As the bells toll the night.

Christopher A. Cipollini 2016