|
|
|
|
- Sin(s)
By Ann Smith
Bless me Father
for I have sinned
And it was so much fun
I might do it again!
Father: Go on, my child, with your full confession.
Penitent: It's nothing so wild! Just a small obsession.
Father: It's the nature of a woman to be possessed of
coy ploys.
Penitent: But this one I blame on the altar boys!
The Elaboration
Eschatologically, Father,
You are in possession
Of remedial steps
To amend my obsession.
You needn't go so far
As to grant absolution.
Unrelenting temptation
Defies that solution.
I know you need details
But that's what's so hard,
Unsubstantiated facts
Have caused this canard!
What's that again, Father?
Oh please, Leave off with the liturgical cant
It can't make me more
Lusty, bold or recant.
It can't.
Back to the altar boys
and the inevitable folly
of the misdemeanor
that made me quite jolly.
(At this point
I have to confide
I have recently abstained
to mentally imbibe).
So, the sin is really
One of omission.
Only my Imagination's guilty
Of the commission.
And this is really the point
which I humbly resent
(You' excuse the mockery
while I vent)
My quotient of obeisance
Has been recently spent.
That put a few Hail Mary's on my tab.
I mean no disrespect.
Thank you, Father.
I needed that.
I will submit to
suffer public castigation
I doubt it will
Cause personal amelioration.
The Colloquy
It was Holy Communion Sunday. I walked to church just for the exercise and
the annual airing out. The sun was shining. The birds were singing. The
ragweed is blooming. The sweet-Annis smell reminds me of spaghetti sauce,
garlic bread dripping in butter, antipasto drowning in dressing, garden-fresh
asparagus smothered in white sauce and topped with a dot or two of creamy
butter, Spumoni on pound cake with a gross of fresh strawberries and lots of
dollops of real whipped cream. A rumble in my stomach, descant to the
gurgle, only reminds me that that's a hunger I won't satisfy soon. My personal
philosophy regarding life is to eat lots, exercise more, and die in church . .
. or in bed doing something interesting, hopefully not alone.
So wrapped up was I in the warmth of Spring, I hugged myself fiercely.
Thankful, for once, that I'm nearly flat-chested and this can be easily
accomplished without resorting to major contortions. I'm a dancer. Although
some uncharitably might call me topless, I dance classically. You know, the
ballet. Tutus, toe shoes, minor contortions, pirouette, Pleiade . . . (No,
that's my other hobby, classical poetry) and cod pieces ( A subject I will
discuss, in length, in a codicil to this piece.) And since my arms were there
anyway, I gave myself a well-deserved pat on the back. Self-love is not like
pandering to politic whims of the masses for their fleeting applause. Pride,
vainglory, is one indulgence in which I can brag gluttony.
Spring is almost like being in love. I lose my appetite for everything
except experiencing experiences. Not to brag, Father, but I could easily do a
protracted stint of lent, with fewer vices to spare, at this time of year. I
feel so heady with optimism. I am regenerated and innocent, like a spring
lamb.
So, I gloried in the scents surrounding me. Like a honey bee, I nuzzled my
freckled nose into the buds until the pollen stuck to my upper lip. I tasted
it with the very tip of my tongue. I sneezed. Big time! (A sneeze that
requires an unfolded hanky to mop up). I delight in the fragrance of lavender
and rose mingled with the clean, steamy scent rising in misty clouds from the
dew drops sprinkled on the asphalt as the onshore flow lifts its fuzzy-flannel
blanketing and sun delicately licks up the moist earth.
I know, Father, it seems like I'm digressing, but I thought you wanted it
from the beginning, and Spring is as good a place as any to start!
The Explanation
What I'm going to reveal next is not so much in the way of an excuse, but
an explanation.
Scuffing my Vaseline-shined patent leather Mary Jane's in a
slide-step-slide-step, I tripped up the stone steps leading into the vestibule
of the very old, very musty St. Matthews Church of the Ascension and
Resurrection. (By the way, does that moniker seem redundant to you? Yes, I
thought so. On that point at least we can agree, Father. Redundant, like the
excesses I stand recently accused of.)
I was in a rarefied state. I felt like singing, so I let loose , Father,
till I saw you scowl. The tone deafness is congenital, so singing with abandon
is something we Capelettis don't indulge in. Unless, we're siting up front
with nobody directly in the pew in front of us. I'm a considerate Catholic
girl, Father.
Church people can be hateful sometimes. They usually turn around and drill
me with that pinched, sour-lemon glare. I can't abide hypocrisy, Father. You
know I always tell the truth. You know, "Ruth, Ruth tells the truth.
Lives in a telephone booth, is uncouth . . . ".
After the organ wheezed out the last stingy note, (Mrs. Cramer stringing it
along for emphasis like she does when playing for the doubles-skate at the
roller rink to let you know the gig is up and it's time to release your
partner), I plopped down on the unforgiving pew's, unpadded surface. Why can't
we have soft padded benches that pillow your bottom, Father? Abstinence from
comforts keeps us attentive, you say. Abstinence seems to be the church's
sitting position on everything! Well, there's not a more lively bunch of
jumpin', gyratin' folks than those Holy Rollers down the street and they have
a sanctuary full of gilded comforts. A church as old as ours certainly could
have saved the few quid needed by now to purchase pew pads. It's pure
miserliness on your part, Father. Take it from the poor box, I say. That was a
Judas comment.
Anyway, I found myself down front, closest to the altar and furthermost
from the sanctuary of the nave. The nave, through the double doors that
annex the anteroom, which connects by double doors the vestibule, abutting the
doorsill opening out to freedom . . . my usual quick escape routes. The front
pews are the ones I rarely choose to warm because they are so close to the
pulpit as to invite scrutiny from your exalted self and I don't need the
attention right now.
I was feeling charitable enough to ponder the homily today without
surrendering to the temptation to check my watch and sigh. I deliberately blow
air up my bangs up for entertainment because you never take the cue, Father,
that it's lunch time and we are all starvin'. You do go on, Father. Makes a
person wonder when they can get a thought in edgewise. Irrregardless,
that's a word that's not a word that you use quite frequently, I might
point out. In for a penny, in for a pound.
What I am going to reveal next is not so much in the way of an excuse as it
is an explanation.
I was snared in the web of serious contemplation. And I must be
hypoglycemic because I was hypnotically hallucinating huge platters of
Spaghetti, 5,000 (a biblical number) loaves of garlic bread, a mountain of
melting balls of Spumoni, a couple of generous glasses of Chianti . . . Which
is why I missed the que at the altar for communions' first call. I know people
up front, file in first, so ignorance is not my excuse.
I don't suppose that before I admit to anything you might be lenient due to
the fact that I came to you without being summoned, in my pious person,
without benefit of anonymity the cloaked confessional provides. Did you know
the confessional smells like a hundred years or so of dust, sweat, and beeswax
laid on thick, like the guilty air so that it almost chokes you? No. I didn't
think so.
Anyway, I'm nearly delirious with hunger. It's nearly three o'clock in the
p.m., Father, and I doubt there's much left in the way of dessert. Carltongue
always eats the last of the strawberries cuz' he dunks a horde of 'em in his
Chianti. Carl is quite clever with his tongue. He can scoop up the floaters,
nifty-like. Not as clever as Susan Marshall, who can stick six (a biblical
number) peas up her nose with her tongue. That's really clever!
Carltongue uses the strawberries as a ruse to disguise the fact that he
drinks copious amounts of the Chianti on Sundays. Everyone is always
mesmerized by the fizzing strawberries! Go figure. I am always amazed by the
fact he can negotiate the table without disgracing himself on his way to the
sofa to sleep off dinner.
So, what I am about to reveal now is not so much an explanation as a
confession, Father.
The Confession
When the last asthmatic note of the doxology thinly pealed off the organ, I
found myself on my knees, alone, in mass. T he masses having filed out and
said their goodbyes a good ten minutes ago. It must have been 2:45 in the p.m.
by then. I'm a good catholic girl, Father, and I didn't want to miss communion
so I leapt up, like a ballerina, and made a mad dash for Gerald, who was
clearing away the wine and bread from the sacraments table.
I meant to just take the elements, normal like, but he, mean tempered bully
that he is, refused my pleas. And I did ask politely, Father. He was standing
there towering over me like Goliath, frowning, stoic, all stock-still
stupidity. Gerald seemed an immovable force to a delicate girl like me. His
big, fat lips curled into a bigger rolled-up, silent NO. I could see obstinacy
etched in every line across his Neanderthal forehead, seething and sweating
disdain and just daring disobedience.
He held the bread plate in one hand and the goblet of wine in the other in
a white knuckled, tight-fisted, tenacious grip. What was I to do, I ask you? I
did something very ballerina-like and confessedly, not very ladylike. I kneed
him in the groin. At which point Gerald howled, surrendered the sacraments,
cupped his crowned jewels with those selfish hands, and hit the cold, stone
floor like a tree felled in the first bloom of Spring. You know, like when
they are all green saplings and it takes a long time to cure!
I did save the sacraments from being scattered all over the beautifully
starched, still pristine, white linen cloth there behind us. The wine would
have made an awful stain, like when Carltongue yaks up supper all over Mama's
Turkish carpet when he's had too many strawberries.
I am sorry for helping myself to the sacraments, Father, I know it's a sin.
But, I knew by this time, (and if you recall, it was almost two-twenty two in
the p.m.) you'd changed out of your vestments anyway. As an altar boy,
Carltongue, is nothing if not compulsively speedy and religiously neat about
stashing the alb and chasuble when dinner is awaiting him.
I'm full of contrition and empty of my just desserts, Father. And the
burdens of excessive guilt and morsels of remorse weigh heavy as garlic bread
slathered in a pound of butter on my conscience. I'd be obliged if you could
find it in your kind, Italian soul, to let me work off my offenses at a latter
date. Oh, and that reminds me, I've heard you put in for a transfer to the
Vatican after the rapture. It'll be interesting for you to discover who's
going to run the show. You are a post-tribulation, pre-milelinnialist, right?
I beg an indulgence, an excuse to be excused or I'll need The Rites,
Father. Truly. I'm not being dramatic when I tell you, you just might see a
premature prophetic fulfillment of my personal philosophy of life. If I have
the choice, I'd rather die in bed. I'm a good catholic girl, Father, and I
counting on a little more practice in my young life so I don't have to die
alone. That's not very interesting. Bless me , Father, for I have sinned.
The Syllogism
"What a strange monster
is man,
a curiosity, a prodigy, a chaos,
a contradiction, judge of all things wretched earthworm,
repository of truth and sewer of doubt and error,
glory and dross of the universe."
Blaise Pascal
The Homily
Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me shall
not hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst. But I say to you,
that you have seen Me, and yet do not believe. All the Father gives Me shall
come to Me; and the one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out."
Therefore, when you meet together (for fellowship between family and
friends) it is not to eat the Lord's Supper, for in your eating each one takes
his own supper first; and one is hungry and another is drunk. What! Do you not
have houses in which to eat and drink? Or do you despise the church of God,
and shame those who have nothing to bring [to the potluck]? What shall I say
to you? Shall I praise you? In this I will not praise you.
For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, which the
Lord Jesus in the night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had
given thanks, He broke it, and said, "This is the new covenant in My
blood; Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me. ' For as often
as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until
He comes. Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup, you proclaim the
Lords's death until He comes. Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the
cup of the Lord unworthily [not thinking about the body of Christ and assuming
that it means nothing], he shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the
Lord. [You have his blood on your hands]
But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of
the cup. For he who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgment to himself, if
he does not judge the body rightly. [God knows your heart. So at least be
honest with yourself in his presence.] If you choose no to, it is the reason
many among you are weak and sick, and a number have even died.
But if we judged ourselves rightly, we should not be judged. But when we
are judged, we are disciplined by the Lord so we may not be condemned along
with the rest of the world. So then, my brethren, when you come together to
eat, wail for one another. If anyone is hungry, let him eat at home, so that
you may not come together and eat and drink condemnation unto yourselves.
|
|
|