Murdered woman Sarah deVries had written about it in her journal – how folks were washing her pain down their throats with a cup of coffee and a piece of toast. Sarah’s words, published in a newspaper spread about the missing women, read like a posthumous prediction.

The mess consumed me. I became a crazy writer lady, composing short narratives about the missing women, leaving them at bus stops or taped to public bathroom walls. Sometimes I’d hand my stories to people on the streets. I wanted to disturb people, because no one seemed disturbed. I kept throwing my furniture at people, only to see it flutter to the ground or thrown in the trash.

As the saying goes, “If it bleeds, it leads.” The papers continued their bloodletting, running special sections for the missing women: A3 to A7, or sometimes all the way through section C. At least something outside the rumble and roar of the Downtown Eastside was making some noise.

For the next six years, the headlines and mug shots piled up and up, until they reached a critical mass and Robert “Willie” Pickton was going to stand trial for a half dozen crimes against humanity’s femininity.

Over those years I gave up on being the crazy writer lady. I became a journalist and my stories went legit.

On the first day of trial, I sat in the second row of the overflow courtroom with my blue pen and reporter’s notebook in hand as the Crown opened its case with bisected heads in buckets strung together against the backdrop of a dilapidated farm and a greasy pig farmer. Suddenly the bone fragments, DNA and sifted dirt spun a thicker picture, heavy with horror.

That night I cried in my bath, but I still had my head. I was fortunate, in so many ways that I felt trite.

The trial would last just shy of a year and hundreds of thousands of words would cross my desk. The pig farmer, as he’s known in these parts, was convicted of second degree murder in the deaths of six of the women, all of whom had lost their heads through some grave form of insult or another. There are more women, but I haven’t cried about the case since that first day in my bath. For a moment after the verdict I thought I might, but didn't.

How much dirt must fill our mouths before we scream? Quiet worm, we be heavy.

*****

Woman's body found beaten beyond recognition
You sip your coffee
Taking a drag on your smoke
Turning the page
Taking a bite of your toast
Just another day
Just another death
Just one more thing you so forget
You and your soft sheltered life
Just go on and on
For nobody special from your world is gone
Just another day
Just another death
Another Hastings Street whore
Sentenced to death
No judge
No Jury
No trial
No mercy
The Judge's gavel already fallen
Sentence already passed
But you
You just sip your coffee
Washing down your toast
For you it's just another day
For you it's just another death
For you you've already forgot
It's not just another day.
It's not just another death

- Sarah deVries