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The Speculative and Science Fiction Online
Literary Magazine of the 21st Century
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A GIFT OF VERSE By John L. Flynn
They was goin' to town for a hangin'--Martha overheard her folks whisperin' to each another, and she felt a sudden chill in her Sunday finest. Seven year-old Martha Goodman covered her ears to the sound of thunder and peeked out from beneath several layers of tattered clothing. Even though dust particles and chunks of debris had long since filled the sky with a midnight shroud, the little girl often pretended she could feel the warmth of a distant sun. Today, she didn't feel much like pretending. She simply watched as darker clouds linked to form a vast canopy of thundershowers overhead, then shivered close to her older brother Joshua in the back of their parent's horse-and-buggy as the cold, October rain began to fall. Every Sabbath, for as long as she could remember, her family traveled the twelve perilous miles over the forgotten highway to Collinsville for Reverend Underwood's weekly sermon, then turned around and headed back to their shelter. Twice a year, she recalled, they made a special trip for Michaelmas and Resurrection Day, and occasionally, without much fanfare, her father road into town to meet with the other elders. But Martha had never known her parents to make such a fuss about a midweek journey. "Somethin' terrible's gonna happen," she whispered to her brother, clutching him tightly and burying her face on his shoulder. Once their buggy had reached the ruins of the small, Illinois town and her parents had gotten out to talk with friends, Martha looked up at her brother. "What's happenin', Josh? Why've we come to town? What are these folks doin' here all dressed up? T'ain't Sunday." "I reckon they's come here for the same reason we have," he replied, lifting her with gentle hands from the rear of their buggy. "To take part in a hangin'. 'Paw' says it's our civic duty to punish all those who done brung us to this sorry state." Martha glanced to the left and to the right. "Who's they fixin' to hang?" "I hear told they's hangin' a real enemy of the people, today," Joshua reported to his sister in a low tone of voice, a finger to his lips. "A poet." "What's a po-et?" she asked, stumbling on the unfamiliar, two-syllable word. The twelve year-old boy did not glance down at her, but looked around the town square as people arrived in twos and threes. "A person who writes things that ain't true," he finally answered. Martha screwed up her eyes. "Why's he do a dang fool thing like that?" "I don't rightly know," he said, shrugging his shoulders. "To stir up trouble, I reckon. I never once did look into a poet-book myself afeard that 'Paw' would take a switch to me. But the good reverend says the words are evil and deceitful. And I believe him." "Then why would anyone want to read them?" the seven year-old asked her seventh question. A patient smile spread across Joshua's face. "Time was," he explained, "folks used to read them there poet-books 'stead of doing their chores. The words were smooth and easy. Made 'em forget what they s'pposed to be doin'. They would dream 'bout the night when it was day, pretend to be others when they weren't, and travel to fancy worlds that can't never be. When folks finally woke up from their daydreams, they realized they had nothin' at all. Most of 'em became unhappy, and begun to make war on others to git what they ain't got." An ancient farmer, wearing worn-out overalls, a grimy red bandana, and a greasy straw hat, interrupted the boy's explanation. "Poetry intoxicates the brain, filling folks with uncontrollable desires. That there is a scientific fact." "Have
you ever read any 'po-et-tree'?" Martha
looked up at him, her bright eyes twinkling as she repeated the new word to
herself. The
farmer's corpse-like features squeezed themselves out of shape.
"Young lady, that's again't the law," he replied after a
moment's hesitation. "Why
just last month, the good folks in Green township done tarred-and-feathered a
school teacher for simply collecting them there poet-books." "I
hear told they's fixin' to start hangin' them fellas as well," another
old-timer interjected. "They
done got rid of all the scientists and politicians already.
They's been hangin' poets and philosophers for the better part of a
year. Don't rightly make sense
why they's so fired up to start executin' teachers now when so many of
them done run off like scared jackrabbits." "Sure
it do! Who'd you think filled
them other fellas with so much hogwash? Teachers!"
The ancient farmer placed both thumbs behind the bib of his overalls. "Besides we have a civic duty to protect these children,
and others like 'em, from the wrongdoers who done led us down this path to
ruin. Can't never risk them
bringin' down another firestorm upon us with their ed-ge-cation." "Wendell,
how'd you reckon they's goin' to do that with a handful of books?"
his contemporary countered, trying to push the children aside. "T'ain't
the books, Griswald," he admonished the other man. "It's the ideas that are evil!" Griswald
shook his head. "I done heard
the folks in the next township are usin' a lottery," he reported, thumping
the other man's chest with the tips of his arthritic fingers. "That
don't make no sense at all!" Wendell exclaimed, thumping him back with the
full force of the fingers of both hands.
"We don't need no damn fool lottery to tell us what we's already
knows." Martha
tugged like a gentle breeze on the leg of the ancient farmer's overalls.
"How do you know somethin's bad if you never--" But
Joshua did not wait for her to finish. "Sis,
we got's to hurry if we want to git a good spot for the hangin'," he
lied, dragging her away by the hand. The
little girl could not understand his haste. *
* * *
* For an hour and a half, the two children stomped their feet and rubbed their arms up-and-down to keep warm. Once the cold, morning rain had given way to a damp, afternoon chill, a murmur of impatience moved uneasily through the crowd. "How much longer we got to wait, Josh?" Martha asked, blowing into her stone-white, cupped hands. "Just a few more minutes," her brother replied. "The good Reverend likes to give condemned men every opportunity to repent before they's hung. I reckon there's nothin' more Christian a man could do." Martha nodded and stared ahead, beyond the ruins of some ancient structure, to the place on the hill where Reverend Underwood preached his weekly sermons. She then scanned across the skeletons of other structures and watched two figures, one leading the other, emerge from the mist-shrouded rubble. Once they had approached the town square, she recognized the harsh, chiseled features of the parson but did not know what to make of the stranger. Martha felt her heart skip a beat and her mouth go suddenly dry as he filled her field of vision. "For Christsakes, Reverend," decried the ancient farmer, "that man ought to have been hung by now!" Reverend Underwood turned momentarily to melt the impatient man down in his tracks with a deadly glare, then exhaled a cold, icy breath. "Some of you fellows want to give me a hand?" There was a slight hesitation before five men, one of them Martha's father, came forward to ready the prisoner for the gallows. Three of them stood by with their farm tools braced as weapons, while two others tied the condemned man's hands behind his back, passed a heavy rope through his bindings, and lashed his arms tightly to his sides. Then, crowding very close to him with their arms always in a careful, caressing grasp, the five volunteers marched him quickly from the town square and up a narrow slope. The poet moved along, unresisting, yielding his arms limply to their bonds and his legs to their fast step, as though he hardly noticed or cared what was happening. Martha, Joshua, and the other members of the community followed closely behind at a safe distance. Directly ahead, the gallows stood on a small hill that was overgrown with tall prickly weeds--the kind that grew on gravestones, forgotten highways, and anything that was dead. A solitary rope dangled from the central crossbar that was supported between two beams anchored to a wooden scaffold. The hangman, dressed in a soiled white robe and pointed hood, snapped the trap door shut with his level, and stood back, waiting. Martha Goodman could feel her heart beating faster with each forward step. Awkwardly, she tried to keep pace with her brother's long stride, but finally, the little girl stumbled and fell on the ragged edges of the broken pavement. Much to Martha's dismay, the other community members ignored her plight and hurried to form a rough circle around the gallows. Moments later, when they reached the hill, the two children had to push through the ring of adults to find a place in front. But as they struggled through the crowd, Reverend Underwood stepped forward and brought all movement to a halt with a singular action. He removed the death warrant from his black, ministerial robes. "Thomas
Worthington Meadows," he read the poet's name aloud, "you have been
charged with sedition, treason, blasphemy, public reading and exhibition of
forbidden literary works, and other acts which have contributed to the moral
and spiritual decay of this township. Legally
tried, according to the laws of this territory, you were found guilty of all
charges and sentenced to be hanged by the neck until dead.
Do you have any final words before sentence is carried out?"
Reverend Underwood gave him several moments to answer, but when the
poet failed to respond, he added simply, "May God have mercy on your
soul." With
that, and a subtle nod from the town elders, two of the volunteers gripped the
condemned man more closely than before, and half held and half pushed him up
the stairs of the scaffolding. Once he reached the main platform, twenty feet
above, the faceless hangman took charge.
He led the poet to a fixed position over the trap door and fitted the
dangling rope around his neck. For
a long time there was only the sound of the bitter, October wind blowing
through the shattered ruins. Then,
as the noose was finally tightened, the condemned man broke his silence: "Awake,
O north wind; and come, thou
south; blow upon my garden, that the
spice there may flow out . . ." Martha listened closely to the poet's words; they were not urgent like a prayer of salvation or fearful like a cry for help but soft, sweet, and lyrical. A kind of music to her ears. "Let
my beloved come into this garden and
eat of its pleasant fruits . . ." Apparently
deaf to his words, though standing right next to him on the gallows, the
anonymous hangman produced a small burlap bag, like a flour sack, and pulled
it roughly down over the condemned man's head.
But the words, muffled only slightly by the cloth, still persisted: "Until
daybreak, and the shadows flee
away, I will sleep amidst the
fountain of the garden and in the
well of the living waters and by
the rivers of Babylon . . ." While
she watched the hangman step back and stand ready at his lever, Martha Goodman
felt uneasy. She could hear
nothing evil in the poet's words, and wondered why they all feared him so
much. Around her, some of the
community members were licking chapped lips in anticipation; others eagerly
sucked in the cold, damp air and let it hiss out between clenched teeth; still
others anxiously counted down the seconds.
One woman, with tears in her eyes, repeated, over and over, "Oh, kill
him quickly! Get it over with! Stop that infernal noise!" Only
Martha stood apart, silent in her appreciation for his verse.
She knew that she was not like any of them, and stepped out of the ring
and walked toward the gallows. Suddenly
Reverend Underwood burst forward, shoving the little girl aside, shouting
"Enough!" He then turned to
the hangman and made a swift, slashing motion across his neck with the index
finger of his right hand. The
hooded hangman responded to his command by pulling down on the lever.
There was a loud, clanking noise, then dead silence as the condemned
man plunged thirteen feet through the trap door. Martha
instantly closed her eyes, praying the rope would break.
But when she heard a loud snap, she opened them to find the poet
dangling with his toes pointed straight down, very slowly revolving, as dead
as the ruined town that lay around them. She
shrieked and started to cry. Her
wailing was the only sound that could be heard for miles. *
* *
* * At
five o'clock the Goodman family was escorted to their horse-and-buggy by
Reverend Underwood, who lifted the seven year-old girl into the buckboard with
her brother. While the adults
conversed for a few moments in the chilly night air, Martha turned to look at
the solitary figure on the hill. "Will
he just hang there all night?" she
whispered to Joshua. He
turned and touched her shoulder. "I
reckon, and probably hang there a spell tomorrow, so's people can
recollect what his world nearly done to ours." "But
his words were so beautiful--" "Hush
your mouth, girl!" he
exclaimed, clamping a hand over her mouth with cool authority. "Do you want
'Paw' and the reverend to hear you? There
be a lot things you're too young to understand now, but when you git older
everythin' will become crystal clear." The
little girl pulled away from his grasp and sat back around, silently, not
speaking, listening to the adults exchange their fond farewells.
Then, as the carriage began to move down the dark October road for
home, Martha Goodman recited the poet's words secretly to herself,
committing them to memory. She
understood all too well. Copyright 2002 by John L.
Flynn Most recent update: October 13, 2002.
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