Memoir of a Second


Rules must be observed, so early morning finds
us in the misty gloom outside our hamlet, me
shivering from chill and fearful for my friend.
The other second sees me load the pistol, I

watch him do the same. Doctors on the sidelines
talk and smoke, anxious for their breakfasts. The
men who must perform remove their coats and
we receive them as we hand across the guns.

His hand shakes badly, but, as no apologies exchange
the plan moves on. Chill fog moves along the
ground, the twenty paces counted out and stances
taken. Cocking hammers sound like small bones

breaking, my heart pounds in my chest, the scene
dreamlike, unwanted. I hear unimportant popping sounds,
and hear the ball strike home, he falls away and groans
beneath the doctor’s hand, then silence joins the mist.

The adversary moves up, forced to look, his face
as ashen as my friend’s. The deed was not courageous, after
all. And now my job continues, for I must see the family.
I would rather not have been here, nor did he.

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