FicWad

The darkest hour has arrived. I shouldn't be surprised; it is the color of my skin that has foretold this hour all my life, for it is true that a dark man shall see dark days.
What do you say to God in your last moments of life? My thoughts darken, and my face is clouded with sorrow as I stumble through my prayer to God. Should I worry whether I am going to heaven or hell? Should I, since I will soon face hell here on earth? How can hell be worse than justice in the hands of the mob? My hands tremble slightly in my prayer's clasp, knowing it won't be much longer until they come. Questions race through my mind as I contemplate what I should brood on before the mob reaps its vengeance upon me for a crime that I did not commit.
Too late. I can hear the drunken shouts of the mob outside of my cell. They beat down the door of the jail like they will soon do to me. Several Christian men rush into my cell, drinking heavily on liquor and hate. They kick and drag me out of the cell onto the road. There, I glimpse hundreds of observers cheering.
"Burn him! Hang him!" Chants rose from the crowd, deciding which torture I would soon have to face.
Flopping helplessly on the ground, I am totally vulnerable to the men who kick and break my ribs, who bust my teeth, who make my blood run, who beat my body and my soul. Like vultures, they descend upon me, their prey, with blood thirst in their souls. The more blood flows out of me, the more amused they are. Their faces are a skewed by the shadows made in the creases and dips of their features. They loom over me, and the shadows fall in their eyes, making it appear that they have no eyes, only black holes, void of any humanity.
Beyond the reapers in human form, the dark sky remains untouchable. It is the blackest night. No moon, no stars. It is as if the heaven itself must shut its eyes from the horrific sight, knowing that such atrocity will only tarnish its purity. Consequently, heaven has turned its blind eye towards America, where the mob runs free and unopposed while everywhere enacting its fatal Lynching Law.
Then I hear it. It hisses like a snake as it slithers around my neck. Like a python, it tightens around me, and soon it will squeeze the very life out of me.
I no longer feel fear, only agonizing pain. I only want to die. To stop seeing the faces of hate, to stop the pain, to stop feeling the humiliation of being stripped naked, to stop having to wear a face of stone, to stop being the victim, to stop....
*********************
As bullets were being shot into the Negro's swinging body, one of the two men who happened to walk by the event commented to the other, "They are so drunk, it's a wonder that they can shoot so well." Nearby, vendors were selling liquor and cigars to celebrators.
The other chuckled and replied coolly, "A mob does all its best work drunk. Besides, these men could be blindfolded and still be able to shoot any Negro in the nearest vicinity."
"Damn right!" a man accosted the two with whiskey-fouled breath. He smiled and gaps showed through his rows of teeth. "We have to keep those son-of-bitches in their place. Can't have no niggers be uppity now. Next thing we'd know, they'd think that they could vote!" He laughed excessively and the others reluctantly laughed along too, knowing that his statement was some sort of a joke that has probably been repeated many times. The man, seeing someone that he knew, went off to tell his joke again, and the two could hear them guffawing about it even at a distance.
A silence followed between the two men until one asked, "Will this ever stop?"
Exhaling his smoke to the closed lid of heaven, the other shook his head, not to say "no" but to shake in disgust. "A better question would be: Has it even begun?"
After delivering such a heavy question, he threw his cigar on the ground and stepped on it. As he slowly twisted the toe of his boot on top of the cigar, the only sound now was the slow creak of the rope, still holding up its burden.