Light and Dark
1
Edison gave us light,
and for that like any sane person
I’m down on my knees thanking him.
But what about Topsy the elephant?
A barker shoved the orange tip
of a smoke up the elephant’s trunk.
She sprained the barker’s foot
or caused him some slight injury and
for that stood in chains outside
a tent. Electricity shot through her.
Edison shook hands with circus higher ups
and ones who did the dark work.
2
So they chained her so she couldn’t move,
couldn’t get away, couldn’t flee, run
for her life, they somehow inserted wires,
to her flanks her chest, hunches. The mass
of her physical presence, a hand threw
a lever, a switch. Edison had it all set, so
the agony start was sudden. How quick.
She didn’t suffer long, the jolts, a hand
threw a switch, bolts of electricity jolted
through her, smoke rose from the ground
but what you can’t see on YouTube is blood
in her eyes blood beneath her ear flaps.
The beginning middle end agony, at least
she didn’t suffer. What an obscene joke,
what a good laugh the sadists had then
as she, chained, went nowhere but down.
Edison didn’t laugh, it was in the interest
of science, to see if it would work, death
by electricity, the pre electric chair days,
before the we’ll strap him into the chair
throw a switch, end this human monster’s
time on earth days. This was an elephant
had kicked a sadist who’d shoved a lit
cigarette up her trunk, for that was killed.
Edison didn’t laugh. The experiment worked.
So an elephant’s one moment here the next
gone. Worked on her, will work on a criminal.
So Edison gave us both light and dark.
Death, destruction, blood in her eyes, blood
pouring out her anus, not on YouTube. We
hear nothing, days before talkies. 1903.
What’s another dead elephant, experiment
a success. Edison felt good. Carcass gone,
time to break out the champagne, toast this
scientific advancement. You don’t see blood
in her eyes. Chains, smoke, her going down.