The Death of Antoni Gaudí

I killed him

I killed the greatest architect in the history of Spain

 

I am a tram driver

or rather

I was a tram driver

it was just another day

a day that would end with Antoni Gaudí stepping beneath my wheels

 

I wonder if you know that he was an old man

his life of brilliance and glory behind him

that I was a young man humbly finding my way

I wonder if you know that he was about to step forward

under the wheels of a different tram

driven by a different driver

before noticing it with a fright

and stepping back

beneath mine

 

I watched it happen, calmly, in real time

I reacted quickly

I did my job

but the tram

the tram is a cumbersome beast and slow to stop

 

he looked like a beggar you know, dishevelled, unkempt

while I, I was dressed proudly in my uniform

the tram jumped as it rolled over him

 

I wonder if you know that nobody cared

that nobody wanted to help that beggar

that I was the person who cradled his head in my hands

who looked into his blinking eyes and tried to soothe him

I wonder if you know that it was me who pleaded with the policeman

to take him to the hospital

that nobody cared for that beggar

 

until, three days later as he lay in the pauper’s hospital

and was recognised

they cared then

and they sought me out

the murderer of Gaudí

 

I was an architect too you know

the architect of a family

look at my beautiful wife pretending not to hear the whispers at the market

look at my two boys who now suffer daily vitriol

whose fists have been thrown in defence and anger

because of me

because of him

 

years pass and I sit in my wicker chair

birds chirp outside but I do not join them

there is no point

I am a man, the man that killed Antoni Gaudí

I have no wings to fly