Even emperors are afraid to die.

No no, said Nero, pacing back and forth

in his Gold House, its mile-long colonnades,

its blank black rectangular pools—

To wake in the dark. Who’s there? Nobody.

No guards by the door. Nobody watching by the bed.

Nobody walking the long corridors, sliding pale hands

one over another—

Nero had a banquet hall slaves dragged about on its axis

like a world.

He had a moveable ivory ceiling painted with weather.

He had a room with a hole at the centre of its dome

which was the sun’s eye.

At midday the sun looked down and saw him covered in gold—

an emperor!

They had taken the gold box that had his death in it.

He called for his gladiator. No answer. The doors were closed.

He thought of the river—

But the underdark of it! All soundless and never again air—

No no, said Nero—

Emperors have seen many ways to die.

Vespasian wept when he signed death warrants.

But he managed.

‘If only I had never learned to write!’ said Nero.

That was the first warrant.

When they brought him Sulla’s head he laughed at its grey hairs.

When they brought him the head of Plautus

he said to himself,

‘Now Nero, why did you fear a man with such a nose?’

Octavia’s head reproached him like a statue.

Sometimes he had bad dreams—

The deaths of emperors are written down.

Julius, beset, made his toga his shroud.

Pompey, stabbed in the back, said nothing.

It was different for Nero. He was a poet.

He slept with golden wreaths about his bed.

On stage the gods and heroes wore the mask of his face.

He had schooled a generation in the art of applauding

            —the hollow-hand clapping

            —the flat-hand clapping

            —the bee-like hum

and at his debut he gave Rome Niobe from twelve till four.

At his Eternity of the Empire games

he made decrepit senators do battle in the arena.

A hippo on a pulley!

A senator riding an elephant walking a tightrope!

A lottery! for pearls, gold, gems, wild animals, slaves.

He watched them from his couch on the balcony—

Some of his freedmen took him to Phaon’s house

and dug a grave to fit him.

If he could just keep Egypt, he said—

They had brought two daggers.

Nero picked them up, tried one against his skin.

Not yet, he said.

Could one of his friends try it first?

Could one of the slaves?

Iron striking stone. From a long way off they could hear the messengers.

‘The humiliation of all this!’ cried Nero.

To lose a whole world—

He wanted to know what Sporus would put in his elegy.

His freedman Epaphroditos pressed the dagger into his throat.

Epaphroditos was killed for helping Nero—