Dial M for Murder

Dial M for Murder

The city hums in low‑key blue,
the streetlamps flicker like a nervous choir—
in a quiet flat where secrets sit in the front‑door hall,
the telephone ring slices the night.

“Hello, number…?” the call cuts―
a whisper of a promise, a foil of guilt.
‘M’ is the missing Morse code, the hill of smuggled grief
that the couched heart of London’s pubs envies.

She turns the dial, pull‑the‑rope faint as moth‑wing and hears the street‑lamplight crackle:
M‑U‑R‑D‑E‑R, each letter a shard of polished glass.
The melody, a thumping jukebox – a music of murder.

The villain sits by the window, a grim whisk‑capped watch
in his pocket, the same antique telling time.
The denouement goes on the RKO screen, no adverts
for posterity; it’s all about the pointlessness of trust.

In the end darkness comes, a silhouette crouches,
and the murderer’s lungs whisper, “I could have been the only one.”
But the clapboards cut, lights dim, the curtain falls,
and the script—like a barrister’s brief—declares: You’re still in the picture.

So between the click‑clack of the corridor bars
and the hiss of the television, the drama flickers:
Dial that letter, feel the flavour of the knife in your hand,
and remember, in every Thames‑lit night,
the weight of a word is always more than powdered sugar:
it’s a promise, a mistake, written in the margins of the law.