What happened? Did they ever get out?”
“Ah, Rhaskos! that wasn’t a story.
It’s an idea I have, a metaphor:
Imagine a group of men,
shackled — as I am now —
held captive, inside a cave — ”
“Like the miners in the silver mines?”
That was how I’d imagined them:
trapped men buried alive in the dark.
“Who caught them and chained them up?
Were they slaves?”
“No, no, they weren’t slaves!
It isn’t a true story. It isn’t a story at all.
I wonder what you’ll make of it. Listen.
“Suppose there were a cave —
and the people inside spent their whole lives there.
They’d never seen the sun or the sky;
They were shackled, held in place,
so they always faced the back wall;
and behind them was a fire — ”
“Close enough to burn them?”
“No. Behind them, but at a distance.
Sometimes animals and men
passed between the fire and the people in the cave,
casting shadows on the wall.
Suppose you were there, Rhaskos —
Suppose you stared straight ahead and saw the shadows move.
Suppose you saw the shadow of a horse, for example.
What would you think?”
“I’d be thinking of how to get out.
I’d be worried about starving to death.”
“No, no! Suppose you had plenty of food;
suppose you were used to the cave.
Remember, you’ve spent your whole life there;
you’d be used to the dark.
From time to time, you’d see those passing shadows.
What would you think of them?”
He opened his eyes very wide —
he often did that when he asked a question.
I clasped my knees and tried to think.
It flashed through my mind: this might be the last chance we had
to speak together. I wanted to tell him
how much it meant, the way he talked to me,
and didn’t make me feel stupid.
There was so much I wanted to say,
I felt the pressure of those words inside my throat.
At the same time, there was a picture in my mind:
that dark cave
and the restless shadows, fire-lit.
“I’d be curious. I’d want to know what made the shadows — ”
“Would you?”
I thought harder, deeper. “No . . .
Maybe I wouldn’t be!
I’d just see shapes —
they’d be like painted designs, coming and going.
They wouldn’t have anything to do with me.
They wouldn’t seem real. I might think they were spirits . . .
If I’d spent my whole life underground —
if I’d never seen the sun —
I might not know what a shadow was —
I wouldn’t know a shadow was a shadow!”
He was nodding, smiling.
I felt the familiar excitement.
I wasn’t stupid. He was pleased with me.
“And what if one day you were unshackled
and dragged toward the light?
Past the fire, out into the blazing sun?”
“I’d like that.”
“Would you? Or would your eyes sting,
would you plunge and kick and try to get back underground?”
He flapped his hands to mimic me kicking.
I laughed. “I’d still want to get out!
Maybe the sun would blind me at first;
my eyes would water —
I might like moonlight better than the sun,
nighttime better than day —
but in time, my eyes would get strong.
I’d start to see real things. Maybe one day I’d see a horse —
a real horse —
and I’d think, I’ve seen that shape before.
That noble head, the mane flowing like water — ”
“But this time, you’d see more than the shadow;
you’d see strength
and depth, and color,
and power.”
“I’d see a real horse! I’d be crazy with wonder!
Maybe later, I could ride it —
You can’t ride a shadow.”
“No, you can’t.
You imagine my story well.”
“Then it’s a story? But where’s the ending?
A story is supposed to have an ending.”
“Perhaps you’ll find the ending one day.
Perhaps I will. Soon.
Perhaps I’ve been living in a shadow-world,
and I’ll come to see the real world. Wisdom —
truth —
absolute beauty.
I’ve been waiting and searching all my life.”
I wanted to shake him.
“You sound like you’re looking forward to death!
Aren’t you even angry?”
“What, because I have to die?
Rhaskos, I’m seventy years old.
I should be a fool, pitying myself
because at long last, I have to die.
They say hemlock’s quick.
I won’t go blind, or deaf,
or forgetful, as some old men do. There isn’t time.”
There wasn’t any more time, because just then, the jailer came in,
with a woman and a boy. The boy was sturdy,
broad-nosed, older than me.
I thought he was one of Sokrates’s pupils,
but he stared at me, unsmiling;
I stared unsmiling back. He didn’t like me being there,
the same way I didn’t like him being there.
He didn’t want to share his father.
That’s how I knew who he was.
The woman kept her veil close;
only her eyes showed: a glance like a hawk’s.
She didn’t come right out and say, What are you doing here?
He’s no kin of yours! Get out! She didn’t have to.
I said, “I have to go,” and I went.
The last time I saw him, I saw him die.
The sun was setting. It was crowded in the cell.
I stood with my heels against the wall.
I wasn’t sure he knew I was there.
Every minute that passed,
I wanted more to leave;
I clenched my hands and held my place.
He sent his wife home. She sobbed and clawed her face.
One of his friends,
a beautiful young man named Apollodorus,
knelt before him crying. He never stopped.
Sokrates reached down
and gathered up the young man’s hair,
running his hand through the curls,
the way you finger-comb a horse’s mane.
He chided Apollodorus for weeping,
but I don’t think he minded.
He talked about the soul with his friends. He insisted
that death was freedom for the soul.
He was sure he had nothing to fear. To die is to come alive again.
He argued about it. He proved it.
Then the poison came.
The jailer who brought the cup was in tears.
Sokrates was touched.
I didn’t cry. I felt as if there were a bird caught in my throat
something thrashed and flapped and shrieked inside me
but it couldn’t get out.
The jailer unlocked Sokrates’s shackles, so he could have a bath.
Sokrates wanted to save the women
the trouble of washing his corpse.
Or maybe he was ashamed. Here in prison,
he didn’t have the wind
to blow the stink off him. He was gamier than usual.
Either way, it was lucky for the women.
He wasn’t gone long. He came back clean,
reached for the jailer’s cup,
and drained it. He’d had to
