Splat

The thing about James Dickey’s Falling

Is how remarkably long it is,

Ridiculously really, even

Risking boredom as the reader thinks

More than once, okay, here comes the ground,

This is it, but no, the fall goes on,

More description, more imagery.

People say time slows down in duress,

But it’s just that the brain interprets

Paying attention as taking time.

In experiments, their reactions

And reflexes don’t really sharpen.

Only in retrospect it feels vast,

That instant between the plunge and crash.

But Dickey never fell from a plane

Any more than Bierce survived a noose.

The packing and packing of details

Between the moment when doom’s been sealed—

The drop, no return, no turning back—

And the instant of actual black,

That’s everything, that’s anyone’s life.

It goes on and on, it seems. It risks

Boredom. It relishes fine details.

It seems to detach from its ending,

But from the plane door or the high bridge,

The fall was ever only going

To be a fall, which comes to an end.