MORE APT THAN EVER

 

WHY WE MUST SUPPORT PBS

by Bob Hicok

 

“I didn’t think of it as killing them,” the executioner

from the late eighteenth century said to Charlie Rose,

still wearing a hood, his axe resting on the wood table

I’ve assumed is oak. “I don’t know how to put this:

it’s as if I loved them in the moment I swung, loved them

and wanted to offer them peace.” Charlie Rose was smiling,

excited. Even more than usual, the joy of an otter

seemed to be swimming through the long river of his body

when he put a hand on the man’s memoir and said,

“But then something happened that made you question

your entire existence up to that point.” It was hard

to see the man all in black on Charlie Rose’s black set,

as if midnight were speaking, saying, “Yes. One day

I looked down and there was the son I’d never had

staring up at me from the block, I could tell

by his eyes, this was my boy, this was my life

flowing out, reaching beyond the sadness of its borders.”

“You knew this,” Charlie Rose said. “I knew this,”

the executioner replied. “Even though you’d never been

with a woman.” “Never. I was all about career.” “You knew

because the eyes tell us something.” “Because the eyes

tell us everything.” “And you couldn’t go on.” “No.

I couldn’t go on.” They changed gears then and honestly

I drifted off, half-dreamed I’d arranged a tropical

themed party on a roof without testing how much dancing

and vodka the roof could hold, people were falling

but still laughing, falling but still believing

there was a reason to put umbrellas in their drinks,

that otherwise their drunkenness would be rained on,

rained out, when I heard the executioner say, “We

were running and running. Finally we made it the border

and I put my arms around my son and told him, you have a future

but no pony. Get a pony.” Charlie Rose smiled

like he was smiling for the otter, for whatever is lithe

and liquid in our spirits, and repeated, “Get a pony.”

“That’s the last time I saw him,” the executioner said.

“And that’s why you’ve refused to die.” “Yes.”

“To keep that moment alive.” “Yes.” “And you believe eternity

is an act of will.” “Yes,” Mr. Midnight said. “Will.

Will and love. Love and fury.”

 

Originally published in Field