“It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known.”
A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens
https://www.stylist.co.uk/books/the-best-100-closing-lines-from-books/123681
A cobblestone square, bordered by the weather-worn granite walls of buildings with peeling facades. A scaffold made of splintering, weather-worn timber. A noose swinging back and forth like the pendulum of a grandfather clock.
Is there a crowd? Of course there is! The lure of righteous violence always draws the bloodthirsty. Perhaps they make raucous noise. Perhaps they stand in subdued silence. Either way, anticipation for an execution fills them.
It’s never as tidy as the climatic finale of “A Tale of Two Cities.” There isn’t an apathetic cynic, exhausted from pleasure and meaninglessness, standing in the place of his innocent doppelganger. There is an actual prisoner facing the hangman.
The end will come. With the snap of heavy rope suddenly grown taunt, a neck breaking, a corpse swinging back and forth. The roar or silence from a sated crowd will follow.
Who would take this prisoner’s place?
waning moonlight
in a serenity few
experience
I wait here listening
for a small, still voice
for Colleen’s 2020 Weekly #Tanka Tuesday #Poetry Challenge No. 160 #SynonymsOnly
and dVerse Poets’ Tuesday Poetics: Last lines (pubtended by Mish)
The pub is open! Come join us!
Frank J. Tassone 
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