Devlin’s Wife

By Lamont A. Turner

Above two graves there stands a stone,
proud with cross engraved,
reared to praise the love that shone,
while hiding love enslaved;
for near it lays a lonely stone,
cracked and worn and leaning,
where sleeps the wife of Devlin
in darkness blindly weeping:
“How well I served the man I wed!
How well his house was kept!
dusting, cooking, then to bed.
(How seldom I had slept!)
I served him well, but now am dead.
(Oh how he must have wept!)
I long for him to join me.”
Above her years had crept.

There stands a stone beneath a tree,
worn for it is old,
its faded face reads “eighteen three.”
The name is left untold.
But for five words, so hard to see,
THE WIFE OF PATRICK DEVLIN.
Not far the corpse of Devlin lies,
beneath a stone with another bride.

Lamont A. Turner’s work has appeared in over 200 online and print venues including The Stray Branch, Dreich, Mystery Tribune, Cosmic Horror Monthly, Frontier Tales and other magazines, podcasts and anthologies. His short story collection, “Souls In A Blender” was released by St. Rooster Books in October 2021.