don't talk, shoot: a poetics

when the Ugly slides his dusty ass into the still warm sudsy waters of the bath in the hollowed out hotel of the town still under enemy fire the Ugly makes the sign of the cross and gets to work scrubbing the grime off his body when the Hunter walks in shaking either in fear or joy or both he points his gun at the Ugly and lurches into a monologue about revenge and death and how far in space and long in time his search for the Ugly has taken but finally this is the Ugly's last minute on earth

when the Hunter's talk is broken by the sound of a shot he falls to the dirty broken floor of the hotel room dead on impact the Ugly lifts his pistola from the suds that was hanging by a cord around the neck and says, if you're gonna shoot, shoot; don't talk then resumes scrubbing the grime off his dusty ass still of no-thought and non-action

i.m. eli wallach [1915 - 2014]