An Ode to Tim Burton's Batman

A/N: This is a tribute to Batman (1989) and Batman Returns (1992), two of my favorite films directed by Tim Burton. Hope you all enjoy it. NOTE: HORIZONTAL LINES USED FOR STANZA BREAKS.


Madness is a spreading plague in this dark city,

this corrupt and bleak city known as Gotham.

Peace is abnormal, devastation is expected.

The citizens subsist in fear every waking hour,

afraid of the unnatural terrors that could only exist

in this freakish, twisted town known as Gotham.


The source of rectitude? – A man dressed as a bat,

lurks the streets at night to combat criminality;

No more, no less a man.

Traumatized in his youth by the very thing he battles–

he remains haunted and anguished over his tragic loss.

Nevertheless, this masked vigilante is not

the only one in this place with undesirable beginnings.


Selfish, aristocratic parents throw their child into

a sewer on Christmas night, shunning his deformities,

resulting in a cold-blooded psychopath with a

sinful drive to annihilate the infants of Gotham.

A once normal, honest secretary shoved out a

window by her crooked boss resurrects as

a mischievous feline burglar bent on chaos.


When the honest and effective law

enforcement is rare and undependable,

the masked bat protects this city

from crazed clowns and other freakish terrors;

but like his foes, he too is just a brooding freak,

finding his place in this gloomy town known as Gotham.