Midnight in Le Chabanais

I just read this article in the Daily Mail and the poen below was written in about half an hour ;

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1175836/Sleeping-enemy-How-horizontal-collaborators-Paris-brothels-enjoyed-golden-age-entertaining-Hitlers-troops.html



Midnight in Le Chabanais


The flower of her beauty has faded now,
Old age has etched its harsh lines,
Into her face that once shone,
With youths irresistible light,
Drawing moths to her chamber,
Those strangers from a strange land,
Whose wings would flutter upon her,
For a fleeting moment of bliss,
Then fly off into deaths dark night.


She sits alone now in a silent room,
Her memories all behind glass,
Surround her with silent laughter,
Faces trapped in a photograph flash,
Midnight forever in Le Chabanais,
Elegance amidst the misery,
Of a war that others waged,
And all she remembers is laughter,
As she danced with all those officers,
Whose black uniforms became the crime,
That she was never allowed to forget.



Now the hypocrisy of the humbled,
Seeking honour amidst lies and rubble,
Rules the day, carving their lines
Into the flesh of collaborators,
As another dark star is born,
In the guise of a swastika,
Which once hung from the windows,
Of police stations and newspapers,
Now worn by weeping femme tondue,
Whose only crimes were living,
Whilst men played their games of war.


She holds the razor in her hand,
Its edge so sharp, reminds her of the smiles,
Of the women of the resistance,
Holding her as they shaved her head,
Cackling like crows over a corpse,
The streets filled with bloody hair,
And weeping whores, spat on by strangers,
Beaten with words, fists and kicks,
By the heroes of the liberation,
Busy aborting the honour of France,
In the name of futile acts of revenge.


No shrines to their humanity remain,
Just broken walls and hidden shame,
No Mozart strains can now be heard,
Filling the room with soft strings,
Nor the laughter of the whores,
Who were once all her friends,
So she takes the razor and cuts,
Deep into the hollow of her wrist,
And as she sees the first red drops fall,
She thinks again of the French flag,
That flutters upon the bed sheets,
As she slowly, finally, bleeds to death.