...Sound of Hate...

It was the sound of hate. 

It was the sound of violence. 

It was the sound of  

“I, as a human being, 

so despise you as 

a fellow human being that 

I want to bring you pain.” 

No. 

Beyond the desire to bring pain. 

To damage you. 

To disfigure you. 

Yes… 

hatred has a sound. 

 

And where do you hear such sounds? 

Well, I’ll tell you. 

Ever been to Omaha, Nebraska? 

 

Er… no, I’m 

not trying to imply such a 

brutal sound exists to emit 

throughout an entire city. 

This sound… 

This sound is selective. 

Sometimes you listen for it. 

Sometimes it searches you out. 

 

It’s a warm summer night and 

I’m sitting in a convertible passenger seat 

traveling North up the Radial Highway. 

There at the corner of Parker Street 

lies an expanse of grass. 

There on that grass, 

some twenty odd men are 

arrayed in an arc around 

two young men at its center. 

Two young men who stand some 

eight feet apart with chests heaving;  

their sweat smeared skin glistening 

under the halogen street lamps. 

 

Though they still stand, 

one young man appears injured. 

He hold his right foot up off the ground 

as if some great trauma had befell it. 

The two men had obviously been 

fighting for some time and one of them 

had had some crippling blow dealt to him. 

And yet… 

And yet this would not sway his hatred. 

Would not override pride nor 

   give way to caution. 

Such was his embrace 

   of hate. 

 

Though limping severely, 

he lunges forward towards that 

which he must achieve reprisal. 

 

And it is at this moment that the car 

within which I ride passes 

the corner of Radial and Parker. 

 

And it is at this moment 

that I can no longer see… 

   but still hear. 

Precisely at the moment of passing, 

   I hear the sound. 

 

It is the sound of one man’s fist 

slamming into another’s face. 

 

Slamming into another human’s face 

with such velocity and force 

as to make the sound of… 

 

How do you describe 

such a sound? 

 

How do you describe 

such hatred? 

 

How? 

 

Ó05 Jack David Hubbell