558
as, with a kind of guilty courtesy,
the executioner helped me descend,
and I realized the journey's end had come–
that was the moment terror seized my throat.
Lugubrious haJlooing midst the crowd–
derisive, maybe, too (I couldn't hear)-
the horses' moving croups, the lances, wind,
the smell of burning torches- all of this
passed like a dream, and I saw but one thing,
just one: there, there, up in the murky sky,
like a steel wing, the heavy oblique blade
between two uprights hung, ready to fall ...
Its edge, catching a transient gleam, appeared
to be already glistening with blood!
To rumblings from the distant crowd, I started
to ascend the scaffold, and each step
would make a different creak. In silence they
removed my camisole, and slashed my shirt
down to my scapulae.... The board seemed a
raised drawbridge: to it I'd be lashed, I knew,
PARTISAN REVIEW
the bridge would drop, I'd swing face down, and then,
between the posts the wooden collar would
slam tight on me, and then-yes, only then-
death, with an instant crash, would plummet down.
It
grew impossible for me to swallow,
my nape was racked by a presentient pain,
my temples thundered and my chest was bursting,
tensed with the palpitation and the pounding–
but, I believe, I outwardly seemed calm....
Wife
Oh, I'd be screaming, lunging- my entreaties
for mercy would be heard, and I'd ... But then–
then how did
you
escape?
Passerby
A miracle....
So- I was standing on the scaffold. They
had not yet bound my hands. My shoulders felt
the frigid wind. The executioner was
unraveling some kind of rope. Just then-
a cry of "fire!" and instantly flames shot
