Page 283 - What They Did to the Kid

What They Did to the Kid 271

things closer when I had them. Shalom, shalom! Oh not like other
men. Kaddish. I am worn from weeping, the psalmist cries. Night
after night my pillow is drenched with tears. I weep till the tears
flood my bed. More compassionate and understanding and loving
and human than before that Friday. Valleys are filled, mountains
brought low. Oh Adonai. In Advent, I advented out of Misery. The
helplessness of carrying on like this. He was the best of the world I
did not know. Gone, with him, that world. I open doors to Advent
deserts. Crooked ways promised straightness. So golden, lord Jack,
so golden. You promised never to leave me. Then you left me. I
escaped on my own through the snow. I don’t disintegrate, don’t die
till the end of days. Feel nothing. Felt so much can feel no more.
They made me what I am. The one question at the dusty bottom
of the academic box of philosophy and theology: How many angels
can dance on the head of a pin? How many times can you die in
a single 8mm Technicolor frame? I, human, shriven, over-shriven,
shriveled. Nearly died. Escaped into the snow. To run time back-
wards, like film, to warn you not to fly to Texas. Running Zapruder
in 8mm reverse: 26 seconds, a fragile six feet of film, final harrowing
moments, soundtrack, Gregorian chant, Irish lament. Each instant
of the 485 frames another frame of past, broken in two places, with
sprockets torn out and burn marks, another frame of experience née
innocence running round and round looped through the projector,
every way but upside down.
The mother, my mother, a mother awoke before dawn, got up.
Beat the alarm. No jangle. Floor cold. She turned. Some former
rich fullness of the morning was missing. The room was right, a bit
mussed. Her house quiet, husband gone early. She remembered the
smoke. No cigarette smoke languishing in the morning air. He kept
his resolution, eating mints from the grocery. Today she remem-
bered a letter would come. That day she opened the letter. Her son
would write again. I would write again. Her boy’s voice on paper in
that strange faraway style he’d fallen into during all those sheltered
isolated years. His gift of a silver letter opener. His mail made her
happy. Not this time. I’m coming home. She cried, she cried. For the
lost vocation. For the lost May chapel, for the lovely scene of Ordina-
tion in lovely summer clothes, bishop humming above window-fan,

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