A Tale of Two

One burned out in the public eye, through lenses of the cameras of the world. Victim of his own fireball. A star so bright it imploded – while everybody watched. Fascination like seeing a snake eat its tail.

And with that meal now finished – a billion people wait for an autopsy report…

Which will arrive like the check in a 4 star restaurant for the guy who once showed a ghoulish side as entertainment. And who in a frenzy of explosives set his head ablaze by accident – for Pepsi Cola. Filming a commercial geared to hit the heights of spectacular-ness.

Well… he had a knack for the spectacular. And he made fortunes from it. For other reasons, he lost fortunes as well.

Two tricks often played from the same hand.

But at least his works led to ultimates of world adulation. Which is what he wanted.

*

But while news of that death splashed across TV screens all over the world and all up and down the dark expanses of Walla Walla where random televisions flickered behind closed curtains and wines fermented in their vats and last glasses of our local reds were sipped by insomniacs… another final act played out.

In the night before dawn, a man of no celebrity walked to 7-ll. Corner of Alder and Wilbur. He bought some gas. And moments later was seen there – burning up.

Literally.

The guy put himself to fire. To fire and flame.

*

And now both men are gone. One’s being eulogized all around the world. The other’s death will get, to say the least – quite a bit less coverage.

Quite a bit less.

And in a sense of shared sadness for their passings, but noting the different scale of the scope of their lives – a sentence comes to mind. A memory…

Nobody suffers like the poor.