Monday, June 1, 2009

Denouement!

ONE SINGLE IMPRESSION
suggested this topic.

I'm not a fan of the stories of Agatha Christie mysteries, but I do admire her puzzle-making skills and her neat mind. The denouement is always a slick feature.

DENOUEMENT!
Denouement! What a lovely word!
One of the loveliest I've heard!
Reminding me of Agatha Christie,
She of the plots so turny-twisty.
She always ties up her loose ends
With a gathering of foes and friends,
Standing around in some vast hall
With beans. (And ready to spill them all!)
Cook and gardener, a high-born lady,
Secretary (a trifle shady), 
Ancient crone, with quite a history,
'Mr X' (now he's a mystery!)
Mr Plod (a neat disguise),
A judge, retired, looking very wise,
A criminal type, all smoothy-smarty,
(Be sure he wont be the guilty party!)
Two sweet young things for decoration
And one very sinister relation!
They stand in groups, neatly separated,
All with their breath very clearly bated,
All of them looking rather queasy,
With the innocent clearly the most uneasy.
Now, in real life, this neat display
All ready to give the game away,
Would be really hell to organise,
Quite impossible, I surmise.
'Where's Julia?' .'She's in the loo.'
'Shouldn't Rupert be in here, too?'
'I've a call to make; please wait a tick."
'This is an awkward time to pick!'
'Lord Pentarthur left at dawn!'
'Oh! (this one's posh) 'He's already gawn!'
'Make it snappy! I've got to go!'
'God! You policemen are so slow!'
Where's Lorraine? Oh dear! She's departed!'
'Get on with it! It's time we started!'
Agatha, in the books we read,
Never paid even the slightest heed
To the awful logisitics of real life!
Who cares if the Doctor killed the wife!
So long as denouements work a treat
And the criminal type admits defeat,
We can close the book or end the play
Wishing real-life worked-out her way!


A real-life mystery here:


5 comments:

quilly said...

If only real life was always as much fun as your poems!

anthonynorth said...

Great fun, and youdunit.

Valerie said...

I shall never tire of reading your wonderful words. Absolutely brilliant.

Brian Miller said...

great! we did a murder mystery event for group of youth a year ago. was so much fun as they walked around meeting the characters, finding clues in the rooms we had set up. the denoument was the big reveal...lots of fun! thanks for the memory!

Kat said...

Agatha was a fav author, when I was a kid. How true - the logistics you define, no wonder it takes the Police so much time to unravel mysteries..!!!

Was laughing reading in the poem Two sweet young things for decoration