Red Wine and Crusty Bread (Man in the hole)

April 18, 2014

It was a simple life. They would lower him down into a long thin hole in the ground. The hole was slightly askew to one side instead of a mere drop straight down. They had a machine made of ropes and pulleys–mostly old re-fixed ropes and pulleys but it worked. He stood on a wooden platform with a square piece of carpet on top of it. Creak-creak creak –the little pulley wheels moaned. Down he went. He would go down past the grass and lower into the roots and soil. Then he would play his small guitar down in the hole in the ground with the ropes and pulleys. I don’t recall the man’s birth name (his given Christian name.)

When he began it sounded most glorious– the rising notes of sunshine out of the dark ground. The sound and the singing would swirl out of the hole in the moist earth. It seemed as  if little golden lights lofted out and up and into the air as the music began– fireflies in the still night. After a few songs they would lower fresh rolls and a jug of wine to the man–red wine and crusty bread. You could almost see him smile from up on the surface. This is what the man lived for.

They were in charge. They had originally dug the hole. They allowed him to come out at night for a few hours. They kept him on schedule- day after day. At the end of the day he was always very tired. Worn out from his playing and signing– they helped him out by the forearms. Pulled him to his feet.

No one knew why he allowed this to happen– the keeping of a man in a long thin hole. Perhaps it was a comfort he took from knowing what was going to happen and feeling good about the pattern of his day to day life. Perhaps he was too scared to say anything. Or perhaps, his love of song and wine and fresh bread was strong enough that playing in a long cool tube of brown dirt and soil was no problem for him at all– the golden air?

Whatever it was, it filled the surrounding town with beautiful music everyday during the nice hours. The flowers grew a little taller and the birds sang back with a little more vigor. The sunshine was a little more, well you know. The man in the ground is much older now and he keeps singing his hauntingly pretty songs.

(This little tale was written quickly as I listened to a finger-picking guitar song by Sam Beam.)

– kyle