The Violin

Upon hearing that Nero played the violin
while Rome burned, I ask: When and how
could he have ever learned to play that instrument?
It is, frankly, an astonishing feat, considering
the amount of time he invested in riding
chariots, not governing, murdering his mother,
yearning to be an actor, the Parthian war,
a revolt in the new province of Britain,
the annexation of the Bosporan Kingdom,
midnight parties, building hotels, and so on.
It’s also impressive because the violin
didn’t exist and wouldn’t be invented
for another fifteen hundred years. That alone
would prevent lesser men from learning
to coax a song from an instrument’s fingerboard
and bridge, but not Nero; he pressed
his nonexistent violin beneath his chin
and made it wail above the ashes. Some men
are just ahead of their times. That’s why,
whenever any modern Caesar says don’t worry
about the plague roiling the streets, I don’t.