RED JOHN DEAD

And you thought motiveless malignity
Was Shakespeare’s turf, Iago above all:
“I look down at his feet . . . but that’s a fable”;
Now: “What did you expect to see here—horns?”
Pure psychopath, and able to recruit
Like-minded dupes to carry out his schemes
With such finesse that Nietzsche would approve
Them all beyond the pale of good and evil.
Not even dead Osama fit the mold
Of Red John’s clever, cold atrocities,
Performed with wry delight, malicious wit,
For reasons no one now will ever know.
The mystery of iniquity remains
Locked in the crypt of psychopathic brains.

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