Summer Splash Supplement 2010
Hero
An oil spill in an ocean happens. There is a fire on the water.
A man on a nearby ship sees the water appearing to be burning.
He misunderstands what is happening, thinking the sea and soon the
world will cook away.
After a few quick moments, he finds out what was actually
happening. But these few short naive moments hold too much meaning
for him. He has already experienced the end of the world. He recreates
and re-experiences this in his mind over and again while at sea—seeing
the flaming water—trying to understand what the meaning is.
Back home again, he goes to his favorite place to get sandwiches
and sits and begins eating. Halfway through, it occurs to him that he can
see the end of the world in his sandwich too.
Ed. Note: Hero was written in December 2009.
Dwight Peters lives in Seattle with a small glass cow and many socks push-pinned into place on his wall. In the past ten years, he has battered his body up and down the American West—living in Portland, L.A., San Francisco, Las Vegas, and several other spots along the way.