Lizzie Borden IV: Obscured Vanity
by Michael Doyle

True to the nature of her kind,
It's always another trick of the mind.
Her ploy of seeded manipulation
Made it a trigger pulled by devotion.

Lizzie found her way to womanhood
Misunderstanding bad for good.
The luck of the Irish made her bleed
For the sake of something seeking to be freed.

As modern science turns its rusty pages,
Passions know their bloody rages.
The age of the well-positioned machine,
Was a clever one to make Lizzie dream.

The matinee fell like an axe - 
With the truth exposed between the acts.
There is so much for good girls to explore.
It's only that Maggie wanted something more.

All the mischief that makes for jealousy
often is the victim of feigned forgery.
Souls are often lost for the sake of trickery.
All that passes are the rites of obscured vanity.

What may seem elegant loses its charm
As truth becomes unwanted, sounding the alarm.
An actress can seem many things, but in the long run
It is in being herself that she is undone.

In youth, so much outweighs the weight of preference.
This becomes cast aside with fouled experience.
Until shared together in a late-night reading
Like Countess Bathory, all women are born for bleeding.

Life can be obsessed with so much cruelty,
Where there is no love, there can be no loyalty.
This is the price of life far too demanding,
And with this comes a very tragic understanding.


(c) October 19, 2026   Michael Doyle
All Rights Reserved