The Night of the Murder

    We saw this coming. Everyone knew. But everyone looked the other way. Pretended not to notice. Or to care. We were all tense. Unsettled. We were nervous. What could we do?

    Which isn’t to say…

    We’d seen the photos. We saw the police on the street, the detectives. We saw the reporters and the news crews. The bathroom window broken. A stranger on the corner. An unknown car parked across the street.

    We closed the doors. Like being in a void. Avoid. Weightless and unreal on the floor. Fallen. The press of feet and hands on my face, my head. Stopped center. Even my skin was ill at ease.

    But what do we know? We were obscure strangers in the dark.

    “What?”

    “We don’t have to…”

    “We don’t have any choice.”

    “Of course we have a choice. We always have a choice. God damn!”

    “Sorry.”

    That got half a smile. But not much more. And no news.

    “Never go that dark.”

    The shadows continued collapsing into the basement where he kept his pornography, his filth. The beginning, middle, and end of all his horror. All the conversational cause and effect, false affect. Fate and destiny forever just below the surface, continuing inevitable. No one paused to consider these things. We barely spoke to each other.

    We smoked cigarettes.

    I remember one woman, a local girl. Unzipped. On her knees. Surrounded by broken windows. Sightless windows. Half remembered buildings passed by, offices moved to new, brighter premises. A disused playground, abandoned by progress, forgotten by the future. Children crossing narrow pathways to secret places. Sheltering in improvised homes here and there.

    Some desire nothing but to keep as they were. Some forget. Some sleep.

    No. No. Forget it all. We had no recollection of night of the murder whatsoever. No barking dog. No surveillance. Nothing. We were trapped. Cold and nervous. The following gaze of prying eyes. Only moonlight on the lawn.

A Farewell to Friends

    The blasphemy was already written
    on the underlying bone
    beneath the skin

    What could we do
    but wait for the denouement?

    Blurring
    burning
    breaking open now
    for all to see

    Close the curtain
    bring down the lights.

*For Andy.
*For Spencer. 

Werewolves, Marxists and other Monsters (Acts 20.17-38)

    While in Miletus, Paul summoned all the presbyopic presbyters and the elders of the church in Ephesus to come visit him so that he could give them a farewell speech. He dispatched a messenger to bring them (three days there, three days back). He sent for them. He couldn’t go to them as he was still wary of the conflict he’d faced in Ephesus, both among the Jews and the Gentiles of that city of sorrow and trials.

    “You know how I’ve lived and what I’ve done,” he said to them “You know there were many against me. Hardships, extraordinary pressures beyond the powers of human endurance – so that we nearly gave up hope of even living from day to day, carrying the sentence of biological death in our bodies – imprisoned, flogged, severely flogged, and exposed to death like an unwanted child. I fought beasts, human and otherwise; I fought monsters of every kind. And you know the truth of it.”

    “I’ve done everything I could for you,” he continued. “Preaching and teaching – in public spaces and private homes. If I thought it would be helpful or beneficial to you, I did it. And would do it again. For Jews and Gentiles – everyone – urging them to look for God and to look to our Lord.”

    “Now I’m on my way to Jerusalem, my final run, I think. There’s still much that I would like to accomplish, but I think this is going to be the end. I’m going to Jerusalem a captive of the Spirit. The wind blows where it will blow; you can hear the sound, but you can’t tell where it comes from. And the spirit goes where it will go and you won’t know why. I don’t know what’s going to happen. The future is uncertain. But, everything that I’ve seen on the road so far, from every town and every city, from every burg and every village, it’s clear that two things are waiting for me there: Imprisonment and persecution. The road to glory always travels through those dark regions.”

    He said this and he was true. The road to glory always travels through dark regions. Always. Except in America. There they seem to think that the road to glory begins in glory and only gets brighter from there. But that is neither here nor there.

    “You won’t see me again, I think,” he said with great finality and wiped his palms on his pants.

    “Soon – not long after I’m gone – you will face wolves attacking from without – and werewolves from within,” he warned. “White collar managerial monsters. Irresponsible men and respectable creatures with filthy appetites. Beggars and rascals. Spiritual panhandlers and theologian thieves, sermon grifters with AI generated homilies and platinum card expense accounts. They are saints of death with bile breath. They are perversions made flesh. They are walking distortions without mercy. They are little g gods preaching a Christ who has no church, and a church without a spirit. Empty of everything. The only thing they have is a travesty of the truth, a tapestry of lies.”

    He shook his head before continuing. “You’ve known me. You’ve seen me. You know how I’ve worked – and paid my own way, and that I’ve paid for all my companions and fellow travelers. By any means necessary, I have supported others. And this is the truth of it: we must exert ourselves. We must work so that we can support others. We must support the weak and the powerless; this is our duty. As our Lord told us, ‘There’s more joy in the giving than in the receiving…’”

    An American Evangelical with a time machine burst into the room at that point and began snarling “No. No. No Jesus never said anything like that. Show me in the gospels,” he growled. “Show me in that red-letter bible that you claim to love so much, where he said anything of the kind. Cite the chapter and verse for me. But you can’t. You can’t because he didn’t. He didn’t say it. He didn’t say anything like it. You can’t turn him into one of your Marxist icons!”

    “Read Sirach,” I told him after pulling him aside so as to let Paul continue his farewell address. “’Do not let your hand be stretched out to receive and closed when it is time to give’. Or read Clement, who said, ‘And ye were all humble, boasting of nothing, submitting yourselves rather than subjecting others, more gladly giving than receiving, content with the…’”

    “Nope. No and never,” the American Evangelical interrupted me. “You can’t trust the Church fathers, and you know that the apocrypha doesn’t count.”

    “Give, and there will be gifts,” I began. “Full measure for full measure…”

    “No.”

    “But that one comes from the Gospel of …”

    “No. I don’t care what you say, Jesus was no Marxist,” he shouted at me, red-faced and sweaty.

    “I never said that he was. That would be a gross anachronism,” I said winking to the reader. “He might have been some sort of socialist but, you’re right, he was no Marxist.”

    “Well,” the Evangelical said with a smug satisfaction, “I think I’ve made my point.”

    “If you say so, boss,” I said. “Now where was I? You’ve made me lose my place in the story.”

    The American Evangelical thumped his Bible on the table, and with a flash of his teeth and a haughty superiority, got back into his time machine and disappeared. I went quietly back into the other room where Paul was finishing with his farewell. The brothers and sisters gathered there hugged him around the neck and kissed him upon the face for they were overcome with sadness knowing that they would never see him again in this life.

Acts 20:17-38

The Fall and Rise of Eutychus

     We were, one night, the last night we were there, gathered together in the upper story of the house, the great room with many small windows. It was late and we’d been working all day but Paul was going on and on, preaching as he did. It was a conversational sermon, Q-and-A, give and take, rap session concerning the glories and hardships of living in the kingdom. And he went on and on and on. It was very late. We lit many torches to light the room. Midnight and many lamps.

    And one of the boys, Eutychus, Little Lucky we sometimes called him, was sitting on the window ledge for the breeze. The room was stuffy with the hot and oily air. Claustrophobic and close. Eutychus sat in the window for a breeze but still he grew drowsy – his eyes moving slowly, his muscles relaxing – brainwaves diminishing - and was soon overcome by sleep. His head bobbed down and up and down and then he fell from the window. Three stories down, he fell and smashed upon the pavement below.

    I’m a one-time sleepwalker, myself. I was fifteen or sixteen, away from home for the weekend at a youth retreat. I woke up in the middle of the night, very early in the morning, on the floor of the cabin bathroom. I assumed that the other guys in the cabin had dragged me there as a joke or a prank on the spindly kid with glasses and braces who preferred Dungeons and Dragons over football. I woke up, cold and confused on the floor, in the dark with no idea where I was. It took several long, almost panicky moments to figure out where I’d awoken. Realizing that I was in the bathroom didn’t alleviate my confusion. I went back to my bunk and back to sleep. I expected that the other boys would tease me in the morning. But they didn’t. No one said anything about it. I realized that I must have been sleepwalking. I had no sleepwalking episodes before that. And I’ve had no sleepwalking episodes since. My younger brother, however, used to sleepwalk all the time. He’d walk out of the house and urinate on the front porch when he was a small child. I don’t know if he still does that.

    But brother Eutychus wasn’t a sleepwalker. He was a sleep faller. And his was a sort of autodefenestration, if you will.

    What is sleep, anyway? No one really knows. Even the neurologists who study sleep don’t really understand it. Neurotransmitters acting on groups of neurons in the brain. It is death and it isn’t. The body may be stilled (somewhat) but the brain is living and active. Sleep is a sort of death. Sleep is a strange country.

    For Little Lucky, the euphemism of sleep became the reality of death. We raced down the stairs and found him, smashed upon the pavement and picked him up dead.

    But Paul in prophetic reenactment clasped the body of the boy to himself and said, “There’s no reason to fear,” he said, “There’s life in him yet.” Yet he was dead. In the strictest and severest sense of the word. We know death. We’ve seen death and we know death. A broken neck is death but Paul said, “There’s life in him yet.”

    We were still there with tears forming in our eyes when, without warning, Paul stood up and went back upstairs to break the bread with the brothers and to continue his preaching until daybreak.

    A few moments later, Little Lucky – Eutychus – coughed once and spasmed twice and began breathing again. I leaned over him and felt for a pulse. It was strong and true. “Speak to me, son,” I said. “Recite your numbers.”

    The boy stood, folded his hands and recited his lessons: “One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten. Jack. Queen. King.”

    We were not a little comforted. There he was, our Little Lucky.

This Week Only: The High Lord Exorcist, Sceva and His Seven Sons

    “Come one, come all” shouted the carnival style barker with a pencil thin mustache and a straw boater hat, “Roll up! Roll up for the magical, mystical exorcism show starring the High Lord Exorcist known throughout the Levant and all points east as the Chief Priest, Sceva and his Seven Sons! This week only! See them today because they won’t be here long! Lay down a fin and see the show. Lay down a sawbuck and we’ll let you participate in the show.” Crowds thronged in the narrow Ephesian streets to see the world-famous exorcists. They clamored and shouted, screaming out the name “Sceva! Sceva! Sceva!” over and over again in their enthusiasm and excitement.

    Careful investigation may have revealed that Sceva was not actually related to the priest Zadok, or a member of any of the priestly families and that he had never actually presided over any sacrifice. He may have claimed high rank as a priest of God, but he’d never served in the Temple in Jerusalem. That the seven young men who assisted him in the exorcisms were his sons was also a dubious proposition. They probably weren’t even brothers.

    But the throngs of people screaming out the name “Sceva!” couldn’t care less. They were thrilled by his supernatural performances in the market square and wanted more of them. They came every day to see Sceva and his sons drive out all demons and astral spirits, all the kosmokratores of the heavenly spheres who were responsible for ailments, afflictions and physical maladies of every kind.

    “The magical, mystical exorcism revue is about to begin!” the street-corner barker called out to the passing crowds. The citizens of Ephesus put down their coin, cash on the barrel, to see the show. They came to feel the exhilaration of being in the presence of Kuru demons – the demons responsible for cannibalistic brain disease. They came for the thrill of seeing Astatine spirits, rare and radioactive, spirits who do not want to exist and are usually vaporized by their own heat, a half-life measured in hours. And yet, in that time, they can do significant damage.

    “Step up to witness superhuman marvels beyond belief!” the barker called, and the crowds came to see the show.

    The Lord once, in the primordial past when waters still covered the entirety of the earth, split the sea and smashed the heads of dragons in the waters, those extraordinary, uncanny beasts from the deep, dragons of no taxonomy, no classification, no order, no kingdom except the kingdom of darkness. But the Jews of Ephesus plunked down their coins to watch the itinerant exorcist Sceva and his seven spangled and sequined sons as they displaced demons with a colorful display of vomited gall.

    The Sons of Sceva called for a volunteer from the audience, someone troubled by a demonic presence. And a bandy-legged old man raised his hand. “I am possessed by an unclean spirit,” he said. Then, waving their mystagogic amulets – amulets containing secret inscriptions and sealed with wax – the seven sons of Sceva began the exorcism ritual as their nominal father looked on.

    They spoke in turns, invoking the sacred phrases:

    “I adjure you by the name of the angel Uriel, the power of light, regent of the sun.”
    “I adjure you by the name of the angel Raphael, the power of health, and binder of desert demons.”
    “I adjure you by the name of the angel Raguel, bringer of fire and harmony.”
    “I adjure you by the name of the angel Samael, angel of venom and poison.”
    “I adjure you by the name of the angel Michael, the great prince of heaven.”
    “I adjure you by the name of the angel Gabriel, the power of strength and player of cool jazz.”
    “I adjure you by the name of the angel Phanuel, the face of God, sustainer of hope and health.”

    And then all held their amulets aloft and, with a choreographed little dance shouted in unison, “Gathered together the forces of heaven, numbering seven, archangels forever. Amen!” And the audience cheered.

    Then, after quieting the crowd again, the old man Sceva himself spoke in a ventriloquist voice that seemed to come from everywhere at once:

    “Great is the ineffable name of the Lord, by the God of the Hebrews, by the unerring knowledge of all that exists. I adjure you by the maker of heaven and earth, to smite you with a mighty blow, to destroy you by the angel of his fierce wrath. I cast out every incubus of natural disease. I cast out all anguipede inversions of the sacred name – even if they be embodied as a man with a rooster’s head and snakes for legs. I cast out ravaging angels, Lilith demons, and bastard spirits. Owls and weaving spiders come not here. I cast out polluted blood, corrupted bile - be it yellow or be it black - and all congested phlegm. Your horns are horns of dust. Your stones are soft. Your eyes are weak. The light that shines from the sun will not find you. To condemn you to lowest Hades, to lie in darkness.”

    The seven sons formed a circle around the bandy-legged old man and began their chant.

    “By the name of Jesus of Nazareth and the name of his servant Paul…”

    But this is as far as they got before the demon within the man interrupted in a voice that rattled shingles from the roofs of nearby buildings. “Jesus I recognize, yes. Yes. Jesus I recognize, and Paul I know. Yes. Yes. Paul I know. But you? Who the hell are you lot?”

    The spindly little man leapt to his feet and slashed out with his untrimmed nails – gashing their faces and gouging their eyes. He grabbed the nearest one while swiftly ramming his knee into his groin. He bashed his elbow into the nose of one of the boys. Blood sprayed.

    The sons of Sceva fled the scene screaming, following after their father who’d begun running as soon as the demon began to speak. “I don’t know you!” the demonized man shouted in a voice louder and deeper than possible with human vocal cords. “I don’t know you!” He laughed after them as they ran away with their matching outfits in tatters. “I don’t know you!”