A poem I wrote many moons hence....

She

By Derrick Reynolds

“What is real?” she asks
He pines away on his typewriter
“What is desire?” she pleads
He swallows his brandy warm

Kissing her hand…
No, she would deny him surely
Touching her gently there…
No she’s much too fickle

"What is love?!” she cries
He listens teary-eyed, wandering
“What is freedom?!” she shouts
A scene to be

May I have this dance…
No, she’ll refuse most certain
Can I see you home…
No, she needs assurance

“You’re all I have,” he replies
She, turning away
("I long for thee") he sobs
She, asleep between his sheets

The Boxer

(the italicized paragraphs should be read in a 1930's radio punch-by-punch commentator) 

His heart: pounding, stretching the limits of his breastbone.  He heaved air into his lungs and looked toward the lights, the smoky lights.  The air was tepid.  Now amid his murky thoughts, he was done, finished, washed up as is said of all would-be heroes who stay on too long. The cheers now jeers, the money never enough, the women — the women and their guile and lips and his wanting more than a beggar ever needs. He was flash once, a razor with gloves and never had such a man so soundly defeated so many.  It was a myth maybe, legend for certain, that each boxer swore going a round with him lasted a month. Those contenders the absorbed punishment given in valor, for to walk into the ring against him was heroic enough.  He scanned the seats of Silas’ Broadway Ballroom. It was never booked for dancing, only for the sophisticated dance; the sweet science.  It showcased Charlie “Basher” McGivney, Jerome “Brown Sugar” Monroe, Tony Gastone, Willy “Punch’ Poutray, Rocky Calaveto, and even the great Marcus Rand who once celebrated a knock out loss to the much maligned Elijah McCormack by shaving his head and embarking into Buddhism.  The new Buddhist didn’t last long and the rematch was one that historians rendered ineffectual and lousy at best.

All their knock outs were legendary but no man held court more dubiously then “Thunder and Lightening” Ben Johns, also known as TL.  The fans loved hating him, his unshaven face, his gaudy robe and arrogance. He spit in the face of boxing tradition and any reporter who questioned his ethics in and out of the ring.  He was champ, not a Rockefeller, he threw his fists for a living, not mud like Hearse.  Almost every opponent’s walk from their dressing room to the ring lasted longer than the actual fight. Almost, he gloated. He got drunk and abused his women.  His jaw was set in granite, so his manager Dickey Villard claimed, but no one listened to him much. He was a shadow man, a stealer of souls, and one of the “good” ones in TL’s employ.  But those days were blurry now and TL’s been hit with much more than a one-two combination.

Round two ladies and gentlemen and the former champ looks rusty and weak. He doesn’t have that famous bull like physique anymore.  His arms look tired and his midsection resembles a barrel more than his chest used to. Sad when you consider he may very well have been the greatest heavyweight of his era.  But those were years too far gone and now the forty year old ex-con is staggering to meet the undisputed heavyweight champ, Swanson “Big Oak” Hicks, in the middle of the ring.  Big Oak took this fight as a warm up for next month’s showdown with number one ranked contender Theo Furquah.  Big Oak circles to his left and lands a series of sharp cutting left jabs to Johns’ brow.  Big Oak looks strong, impressive with arms like cannons and legs to match.  He captured the belt in ’33 after knocking out then undefeated champ, Lenny Rueben, in one round, a stunning yet foreseeable occurrence.  He’s some fifteen plus years younger than Johns, almost a head taller, and moving with ease, like he’s skating on the canvass instead of stepping; in contrast, it’s almost like Johns is standing still although his feet ARE moving. Another jab and Johns backs up. Big Oak has held the belt for a little more than two years, not like the ten Johns held it which now seems like eons ago.  Big Oak is peppering Johns with vicious tenacity. Sharp rights and straight armed lefts are bouncing Johns all over the ring.   In years past, Johns used to administer the same type of punishment, but tonight is 1935, not 1923.  But ladies and gentlemen we all know that Johns is an unimpressive two and oh in his comeback and if my sources are correct, both opponents were found sleeping under the Brooklyn Bridge.  Back to the action, Big Oak just landed a menacing three punch combination that has opened a severe cut under Johns’ right eye. It makes the gash Sammy Willow put on Hector Montez look like a paper cut.  Blood is draping Johns’ torso and he is leaning mercifully on the ropes.  The crowd, almost to capacity now, is wild with anticipation of a knock out. Just listen to them holler: “Big Oak, Big Oak,” over and over. Big Oak Hicks looks ready to end this but you have to give Johns credit; that mythic granite jaw of his is standing up.  Ten seconds left and Big Oak is pummeling Johns.  Rights lefts. Oh, there’s a mean uppercut to Johns’ ribs. Johns looks done.  There’s almost no offense at all from the former great save a few wistful right hooks which found their mark on Big Oak’s shoulders.  That’s it, the end of round two and unless a miracle occurs or Swanson Hicks has a change of heart, Johns looks all but finished…

The people laughed now, like they did when he went to jail ten years ago.  It was raining then, much like tonight, and the drinks kept flowing. She knew him from another time, a place where he fled to when things became like lead at home with the wife and kids.  He was drunk again and looking to sink his body into hers once more.  But she had other ideas as did all those loose-ends he slept with.  She had pictures, receipts. She threatened to go to the police, the press, to end his career.  It was one thing to be reckless with yourself, it's another when a young wife and small children are involved. The citizenry maintained a moral compass. She wanted money; the stench of greed was all about her.  Her eyes were darker. 

The stool kept him upright. He was wishing he was anywhere but here, tonight, in this ring fighting for something beyond his need. The audience was a roar, but he didn't hear them. They were never for him anyway, just for the blood, and he spilled plenty.  That night, that fateful night, she mocked and teased him with her legs, showing him what he would never have again. She wanted five grand, manageable but not on this night. The bar was full of drinkers who came to get drunk fast and stay that way as long as the good lord granted. It was his bar, The KO Club.  Most patrons were lowly blue collar Joes or pimps and pushers.  He didn’t care as long as the dough was pouring in. She hiked her dress up a bit more and he grabbed her throat.  That, he claimed,, was all that he remembered of the night.  She was dead, broken neck, and he was sentenced to eight years.  His championship revoked, his belt apprehended, his career ended, his marriage and family…ended. 

Round three and the combatants circle one another. John is originally from Trenton but now lives in Baltimore, while Big Oak hails from Detroit and is as brutal and talented as they come.  Johns throws a wild right hook and follows up with a left uppercut.  Big Oak steps back, throws a few soft left jabs of his own and quickly switches to southpaw.  Johns shakes his arms and wipes the ointment from under his eye. His cut man, another ex-con Ernie Ginetti, has done a marvelous job between rounds to stop the flow of A STUNNING CROSS LEFT  OPENES IT AGAIN! A RIGHT, LEFT, JOHNS IS HURT; HE’S STAGGERING TO HIS CORNER, HIS MANAGER, ABY LUBER, IS SCREAMING FOR HIM TO MOVE, BIG OAK CUTS OFF HIS ESCAPE AND IS THROWING BOMBS. JOHNS IS DAZED. OH WHAT AN UPPERCUT AND JOHNS’ HEAD IS ALMOST KNOCKED CLEAN OFF!  IN FORTYEIGHT FIGHTS HE’S NEVER BEEN KNOCKED DOWN. BIG OAK LANDS A THUNDEROUS BODY SHOT AND THAT’S IT! THAT’S IT! JOHNS GOES DOWN! The referee moves in and motions for Big Oak to go to a neutral corner. He picks up the count at four, five, Johns is struggling to his feet, six, seven, and he’s up and shaking his head. His jaw is truly granite. He looks around the audience as if in search for an answer.  He shakes his arms loose.  Most men would have been in the land-of-nod but Johns looks surprisingly steady.  He wants to continue.  The referee wipes Johns’ gloves, looks into his eyes, there’s fifteen seconds left in the round. Remember, these are New York City rules.  There is no saving by the bell. The referee is letting it go on. Big Oak looks dumbfounded.  He’s knocked men out with less before.  The crowd, standing room only now, is at a fevered pitch. Big Oak looks cautious.  He throws a left hook to the body, an overhand right just misses, Johns pushes him away and lands a solid right of his own. Ten seconds left.  Oh, that caught Big Oak’s attention and NOW Big Oak looks a little shocked. He steadies himself and JOHNS LANDS ANOTHER RIGHT AND THEN A LEFT!  Wow, the old man has something left. Another straight left and Big Oak tries to laterally escape. Three seconds left and that will end round three. Johns survived the barrage but landed a few good power punches. As he walks to his corner, some in the audience are beginning to cheer for him.

Cigar smoked wafted passed and he inhaled a good portion, held it, and let it slowly leave his lungs like a deep sigh.  He settled onto his stool and gleamed over the crowd. There were all types, just like prison, and just as ravenous for brutality. Winning was secondary; the more pronounced and decisive a loss, the more they craved bloodshed.  He craved for relief in prison. Not so much from the bars, the concrete, noise, or smells, but from his own ego.  He was beaten by the guards, by the gangs, and stabbed once while the prison celebrated Christmas. He was showering, alone, a Cardinal sin.  No one survived prison alone.  They slipped the guard a few bills to turn a blind eye and they went to work on Ben. Not a sound; they clobbered him but he managed to get in a few good licks.  Bodies were flying and once the blade went in, the lights went out.  He winced, his eyes opened, the tiled wall once white was now dappled red.  The warm shower pelted his body as he laid crying and bleeding. Simon Pert, a taut black man was serving life for double murder.  He had already spent forty years inside Mebane Morris Penitentiary, and now stood over Ben, a mop in hand and smiling. 

Round four ladies and gentlemen and Johns is off his stool first, gloves by his sides.  Big Oak looks toward his corner and chomps down on his mouthpiece. Here we go.  Big Oak throws an overhand left that misses and Johns counters with a right jab that lands squarely in Big Oak’s mug and straightens the massive fella up. Big Oak counters with a jab of his own and the two trade body shots.  Johns is breathing through his mouth, he seems hurt, maybe that last body shot took the stea/ JOHNS LANDS TWO  STRONG LEFT JABS TO BIG OAK’S FACE AND THE CHAMP BACKS UP!  ANOTHER LEFT HAS HICKS REELING.  HICKS THROWS A COUNTER RIGHT WHICH MOMENTARILY STUNS JOHNS, AND JOHNS COUNTERS WITH YET ANOTHER LEFT. His left is finding its mark at will.  The crowd is going wild; the once partisan Big Oak contingent is now doing something these ears have never heard before…they are cheering for Johns.  The chants of TL are melting into the cheers for Big Oak and JOHNS LANDS ANOTHER STRONG RIGHT AND A LEFT UPPERCUT AND HICKS IS SOMEPLACE HE’S NEVER BEEN BEFORE. HE IS HURT AND NOW STAGGERING BUT MANAGES A LEFT HOOK TO TL’S MIDSECTION. TL is stopped in his tracks and now the two circle each other measuring and assessing. Hicks has never, I repeat, never  been hit this much in any of his twenty five fights, including the one against fast handed Joey Franks.  Hicks seems to be regaining himself. He stuffs a strong left into TL’s mug and TL answers with a stiff right hook that finds its way to Hicks’ liver.  AND THERE’S ANOTHER RIGHT AND ANOTHER, AND A LEFT NOW A RIGHT AND…OH MY A THUNDEROUS LEFT UPPERCUT HAS WIGGLED HICKS’ HEAD AND TL IS LOOKING FOR BLOOD.  Six unanswered blows and Hicks looks bewildered. TL circles, staying away from Hicks’ storied right cross and lands yet another stiff left jab and Hicks backs up. There’s twenty seconds left and the crowd has absolutely drowned out Hicks’ manager’s cajoles.  Ten seconds left and OH WHAT A SHOT BY TL AND HICKS IS IN DANGER, A LEFT HOOK TO THE RIBS, A RIGHT TO THE TEMPLE AND HICKS IS DOWN!  HICKS IS DOWN FOR THE FIRST TIME IN HIS CAREER AND HE DOESN’T LOOK LIKE HE KNOWS WHERE HE IS.  WHAT A SHOCKING TURN OF EVENTS!  The referee picks up the count at four, the bell rings, the referee remains on the count.  Six, seven, and Hicks is on his feet, no way resembling the man in the first three rounds. He looks unsure and wobbly.  The champ’s never been hit this hard. TL is showing just how much heart he has and the crowd is loving it….

Simon Pert was the reason Ben survived and he became the reason Ben wanted to live . He listened to Pert’s story, the torturous night he saw his wife being raped by two white men, the night he shot both to death. The night he knew the law would betray him. In his younger days among the tobacco crops of South Carolina, he realized what had been gained by emancipation and was all lies.  Delaware, a northern state served as his crucible and summarily sentenced him to life without the possibility of parole.  The judge, jury, town didn’t care that the rapists were notorious for their ravaging ways, their malevolence. They didn’t care that the two white men broke into Simon’s home, raped his wife, repeatedly, while the neighbors became selectively deaf to her cries for help.   Young and intelligent but more importantly black, Simon Pert was as much a marked man inside South Carolina as he was when he went to work for Pierce Industrials in Wilmington, Delaware. He was rare, like the fabled white elephant; he was a black man with a college degree with an intrepid will. But his resolve and poise left him that night. His beloved wife never regained her former self. She was once vibrant, charming, affectionate. She was smart, keen.  He loved her the very moment they met and only had the pleasure of her for a few years.  The woman he thought he would build a future with was now the woman he'd wish would kill herself.   One night, on the eve of his twenty-fourth birthday, Eloise Octavia Pert answered his prayers and hanged herself.  A note she left on the ground by her dangling feet read:

To come back again black and do it all over again, to come back white and never know pain. Please Lord, please let me stay where you keep me.  I can’t take being black and alone anymore, and I never wanted to be white. 

For the first time since being a child, Ben earnestly listened to a person who unfastened his thoughts and shared the reasons for his living and loving.  The more Simon spoke, the deeper Ben relived the pain he’d caused so many.  He was a bigot, womanizer, an abusive man who fed his ego regardless of whom it hurt. The men inside the ring were lucky, they could defend themselves with moderate safety, there was always a referee.  But the men who drank with him, the ladies who slept with him, and the bookies who tried to break him all felt Ben's ire.  

Simon steadfastly mentored the ex champ and did so because he knew he had one more chance to be free.  A piece of him, if secured to Ben, could live outside Mebane’s walls and endure. A small piece of him could live on and change the very fabric to which Ben wove his torments.   Ben was Simon’s salvation and as years passed, Ben became soft of heart and strong of soul.  Redeemed. 

SMoke swirled in the evening night as men and women listened to the heavyweight championship over the radio outside Clark's Hardware.  Some sat in folding chairs while other stood.  There was talk, betting, drinking, and listening. Everyone was listening.  

The unthinkable may be at hand. TL, once a hated champion then hated resident at Mebane Morris Penitentiary, then hated parolee who claimed he’d atoned his sinful ways, wanted to fight for the heavyweight championship once more with all proceeds going to charity. This beaten man is on the cusp of a tremendous upset.  Sources say he signed the contract but was only given the chance for the belt in a winner takes all purse. Folks in the sporting world considered this insane and pointless, but it looks like the devil or should I say angel might get his due.  He exited Mebane a sounder thinker and church man, remarried his ex wife, re-connected with his now grown children and opened a small church in South Baltimore.  A brave man indeed.   Okay, Round five and TL is up on his toes and bouncing like the TL of old. Hicks is sluggishly making his way toward the center of the ring. His arms look heavy and he’s got the look of a desperation in his eyes. A desperate man is always dangerous.  His left eye swollen shut and TL EXPLODES WITH A FEVERISH FLURRY AND HICKS LOOKS CAUGHT UNAWARE. LEFT, RIGHT AND the two men clinch in the center of the ring. Hicks is hanging on for dear life, TL is poised for the knock out and he's the best finisher the division has ever known. Forty six of his forty eight fights ended in ko’s and now the forty ninth looks like a shoe in.  They are still in the clutch, referee Johnny Basiglia tries to separate them. OH MY LADIES AND GENTLEMEN! TL HAS GONE DOWN, HARD, AND BY MY ACCOUNTS HE WAS SLUGGED BY AN ILLEGAL ELBOW! HICKS THREW A RIGHT ELBOW TO TL’S TEMPLE WHILE THE REFEREE WAS SEPARATING THE BOXERS AND TL IS HURT!  Oh what a scoundrel!  While the referee was in between the two, Hicks let loose a vicious right elbow to the left side of TL’s face and now he’s bleeding like a stuffed pig. Blood is everywhere but the referee didn’t see the infraction, he only saw TL’s fall.  I did see it, and in my twenty years of watching and announcing prized fights, I never miss a shot.  Hicks looked scared and desperate and now, THE REFEREE HAS COUNTED TL OUT!  HICKS STAGGERS BACK TO HIS CORNER AND IS BEING LIFTED ONTO THE SHOULDERS OF HIS CORNERMEN.  THE CROWD IS INCENSED!  LIT CIGARS AND PAPER CUPS ARE BEING TOSSED INTO THE RING.  A few ringside policemen have stepped in and TL is still down.  He is not moving.  The authorities are trying to take control and clear the ring. Some brawling patrons attempted to enter the ring but were turned away quickly.  Wellington Silas, the ballroom’s owner, is pleading with the patrons to stop the madness. Let me remind the listening audience that TL is still down, bleeding horribly and not moving at all.  Hicks is apparently still champ and is making his way, with the protection of New York’s finest, to his dressing room.  None of the judges seem to have caught the elbow either, but we’ll find out more later.  I sure do hope some bloke with a camera caught what I saw and hundreds of paying customers saw….TL is STILL not moving.  It doesn’t look good, the doctor has been summoned and now they are bringing in a stretcher.  Oh this is very ominous for TL and his family and corner.  His cornerman, ex middleweight champ William “Black” Blaxon is seen crying, oh this is bad. The crowd is silent, the doctors are working on TL, I can’t tell exactly what procedure they’re doing but nothing seems to be working.  TL is not responding and now he’s being carried out of the ring…

The night always seemed like a liar to Simon.  Once it was magical, with stars for the naming and a future to be claimed.  The screw's cigarette smoke wafted over Simon's head.  

“Simon, hey boy, Simon, heard your white boy died.” mocked the screw.  Simon didn’t look up, only mopped and made sure the floor was cleaned. 

Maybe, Just Maybe

It's started already. Four games in, 1-3, and I'm trying to figure out what I'm doing so wrong that is screwing my O's. Is it the O's glass I employ during games?  I bought it last year for the stretch run thinking the mojo would inch us into the playoffs.  We faded. Is it my new O's hat, the one with the low crown and crisp Orioles cartoon smiling amid a black background and sharp orange brim? Not the right one for this year?  It isn’t the 1983 white and black and orange affair that saw us win our last World Series.  Maybe I should only wear it for home games? I have an older hat I bought when my father was dying.  I got him and me low crown O’s hats with the scripted O’s on the lid.  I bought for his birthday, in 2005, and I don’t think he ever wore it.  Maybe I was thinking it could bring some magic and help him live longer, maybe even somehow (in my panic) it could even cure him. It didn’t, I knew it wouldn’t, but I wore it daily.  The O’s were still losing, but leave it to me to believe that hat had the power to propel us to 93 wins in 2012. The hat was already seven years old and I was fooling myself, just like with dad. 

Maybe since Donna and I are 3-0 at home the past year she and I should go to every other home game remaining? You think we could go 79-2 at home this year?  I know, no.  I got it, maybe it's that I have my O's license plate covers on the wrong ends. I'll change them today. The front is white with black and orange script and the rear is black with white script.  Maybe I need a cold Natty Boh at hand during the games, you know, just in case?  Maybe it’s not about maybe and maybe I should stop with all the madness? Hmm?  I have no power, I get it, and I understand it’s just a game. Four games in and I'm blaming myself. Four games in and the season is unfun. 

I’ve always placed too great a meaning on an O's win and too great a punishment for a loss.  I remember growing up and rushing to the newsstand to see the box scores and resting my moods on the O's and the Colts.  The Colts though were long gone by 1972 but that didn’t stop me from sheading tears March 29, 1983.  No mojo worked then. But the O’s were still Baltimore’s.  My dad and I would talk baseball and he would get so pissed with me because I never got any of the statics correct. I would make shit up just to talk with him about the O’s and he would yell, “Get your facts right!  Goddamn it!”  I’d brush it off because it was the bonding I yearned for.  There was a time in 1985 when I spewed a stat about Don Mattingly and seemingly simultaneously the Chuck Thompson echoed my words. Dad was floored, looked me in the eye and praised me.  “That’s it!  That’s what I want to hear!”  If only I were better at it maybe dad and I could have been closer, who knows?  But my mojo has never worked.  No amount of contrived rituals worked, ever, and you'd think after 40+ years of loving the O's I would have learned how to temper my angst and adulation.  Alas, poor Derrick, he's slow on the uptake. It's just a game.

As kids we played every chance we found.  I wasn't serviceable, was usually picked first or second for the teams, and occasionally could knock the shit out of the ball; but only during neighborhood pick up games. For some reason, when I donned an official uniform for official league play, I stunk up the field. I had no confidence, none. Couldn’t get out of my own way and looked like a boy with no arms or legs out in the field. I never got why I could be like Doug DeCinces on the sandlot but ridiculously inept in a regulation game.  Maybe my therapist can help with that.    Anyway, we’d play every day, all day, and I swear we didn’t finish one game. Ever. Usually there would be someone getting pissed off for whatever reason a teenage boy does, or the score would be so ridiculously incalculable that it didn't matter anymore and we’d switch up teams.  There were lots of times when someone's feelings got hurt because of the collective ribbing we unloaded on them. Ribbing? Too soft a word.  We unleashed a blitzkrieg anyone we subconsciously and collectively agreed upon was to be blasted.  We were merciless, mean. We all had our turns and all was forgotten after the day’s end. But we always came back for more because baseball galvanized us.  It brought our neighborhood together whenever we played other neighborhoods (always kicking their asses).  Baseball was our rite of passage, our escape, our raison d'être. 

So today I sit with my O’s at 1-3.  One and three.  The sun came across the east, the skies obeyed their cosmic lords, and I woke.  I woke. 

Professor Peabody and Sherman meet Jesus.

 He inhaled deeply, then with one swift motion, sat upright and began gulping air like a man dying of thirst.  Dying or dead.   Jesus stood by the doorway, mouth agape, hands trembling.  The once “dead” Lazarus stood and frantically tore at the shroud covering his body and head. The air was still and Jesus could hear his own heart beating, the blood whistling through his veins.  A hand gently touched his shoulder.

Jesus slowly turned like a rusty screw, sweat beading on his brow, and noticed a smallish, bespectacled white dog and a comparably smallish pale boy with fiery hair apologetically standing inside the slight entranceway leading into Lazarus’ tomb. 

“Hello there, I’m Professor Peabody and this is my young cohort Sherman. We’ve just arrived in town from our moment in time, the 21^st century, and were wondering if you could tell us where and possibly when we are?” His voice bounced off the grotto’s walls and all over Jesus’s head. He stood slack jawed and silent. His eyes crossed then found focus, but his mind ebbed back to Lazarus.   “Huh?”

“Terribly sorry sir, have we caught you at an inconvenient time?” such a polite professor. 

“Uh, no, no, um you’re not bothering me.” Jesus’ voice tailed off then rebounded.   “I was told to help ‘save’ this guy,” Jesus said waiving his hands excitedly in the air making faux quotation marks for emphasis.  “When I got here, all I did was touch him, and the dude started breathing and sat straight up. DUDE! He was dead. Holy cow!  Scared the hell out of me.”  He bent at the waist resting his hands on his knees lest he lose strength and fall flat on his face. He was pale, yet welcomed the their arrival.

Lazarus stood naked and panting, his beard and hair mashed down from sweat and his long journey back.  Professor Sherman moved his glance around Jesus’s back to gain a better look-see. “Sir, there’s a naked, sweaty man staring at us. Have we interrupted…”

“Of course he’s naked!” said Jesus, “he’s supposed to be dead.”

“I see.” Responded the good professor.  Sherman, for his part, stood respectfully silent, eyes canvassing the caves environs. He was a good observer.

“Yeah, dead, gone, deceased, outta here, pushing up daisies, whatever other euphemisms there are, he was it.  Lazarus is supposed to be dead but no, they wanted him back for some reason, and now look! I really need to start saying NO more often.  Give em all an analogy or something for them to ponder, and then change the subject. That’s what I’m going to do for now on.” Jesus spoke into his chest, hands still a trembling, sweat still a beading on his brow.

“LAZARUS!” Both Professor Peabody and Sherman barked out the name and for an instant all four stood silent.  The quietness exposed everything.  The three turned their collective gazes onto Lazarus who upon noticing their stares, instantly held his breath to soften the noise of his breathing. He was very self-conscious about causing a scene.

“Lazarus you say, (ahem) excuse me, but that would make you, Jesus, right? Jesus of Nazareth, or Judea or…where exactly are you from, sir?”  Always the seeker, Professor Peabody began rubbing the small of Jesus’ back.  Was this actually the man? Was this the savior of billions across the centuries?  The good professor once more cleared his throat, an audible cue for all to listen.

“Excuse me sir, you are Jesus, correct?”

“Yeah, who the hell else? Man if this guy walks out of here and his family sees him…they’re gonna think…I’m in big trouble fellas.” Jesus quaked.  “I really done it this time.”  But this was no simple slight of hand or curing a blind person, no, not that simple.  Physics aside, this resurrection was a leap into a quantum quagmire.  Raising the dead just elevated Jesus from simple preacher and sidewalk magician into the very one-and-only-Messiah. His thoughts raced back to his father and mother, his childhood home. For an instant he recalled the aroma of freshly baked bread and tasted the coolness of sweet spring water on his lips. He yearned. 

“Maybe, maybe if you two help, we could kill him again…he wouldn’t be able to walk out there I’d be off the hook, I could go home.  I could learn a trade, something different, like masonry this time. I told pops that carpentry was good but you need a lot of tress for that. You see? So, maybe if I go home now, start all over, settle down, get married, maybe go to school, get a degree, maybe join the army…” Jesus’ free association in regards to his future did nothing for poor Lazarus still holding his breath.  He exploded with a gasp. 

“Whoa, whoa, just a minute. You raised me, I’m alive again…but I just made peace with…I was minding my own.…” his voice tailing off like a bird’s song as it flies away.

“Shut up Lazarus, just please!  Just a minute, just one, let me think...I need to think.” Jesus paced while rubbing his whiskered chin.  His beard was coming in well, very thick and even. He had great whisker integrity.  His strides were fluid and moved smoothly almost frictionless. 

Whispering to Sherman, the Professor Peabody said, “Clearly he’s the Son of Man, and clearly the Way Back Machine took us wayyyyyyy the hell back to the year (licking a pencil tip and scribbling some notes in his pocket note pad) of our Lord 33 AD…and we might be or clearly we are, in way over our heads. What say you Sherman?”

“Yep, and clearly Jesus is loosing it,” Sherman replied and pointed at Jesus who had a firm grip, with both hands, around Lazarus’ neck and banging the poor man’s newly resurrected head against the stony wall of this-once tomb. 

“Quick Sherman, grab our Savior!”

“But he’s bigger than me…”

“Then pull his hair!”

Within a matter of seconds, Professor Peabody and Sherman wrapped themselves around Jesus and managed to pull him off of Lazarus, just before he consciousness.  The cave permeated with the smells of heated bodies, a dog, and the Messiah’s fear; which was all too tactile.

“Lord Jesus Christ, Oh Lord almighty, oh God and Baby Jesus…. control yourself sir! Sit thee down.”

“Sit thee down, Professor?”

“I’ll admit it’s a bit papal, but we need him, you sir, to remain calm.” As Peabody pleaded, Lazarus slumped to the ground, again having to gasp for air. This time; however, he was fully aware and teetered on the edge of panic, but something worse overtook him.  Lazarus stood and wrapped the death shroud around his waste. Disillusionment: much too heavy and deep for even his comprehension, fell upon him.  “The hell, man? What I ever do to you?”

Jesus slid his back down the damp, dirt wall and landed his bottom with a thud.  He sighed. “These people take and take from me, and once they find out about Laz, they’ll take till there’s nothing left of me.  I’m not even sure what happened here. Once, in India where I ventured to learn, a small shepherd boy died in a swollen stream.  His mother wept so sorrowfully that I could not contain my anger.  Why this boy, I screamed. Why?!  But there were no words to comfort.  Nothing.  I just stood there, crying with the mother, holding the dead boy’s body in my arms.  My guru, the man who bore me on his intellect, taught me a valued lesson that day.  Dead is always dead.  Dead and life, the two, the breathing and the not breathing are what we do, if not by thought, but by consequence. You must leave the dead to themselves and allow them to return to the source, our father. If not, everyone will want their loved ones back and what then?  No death? No room at the inn, right?”

“Lord…”

“You keep calling me that. You know something I don’t?”

“Lord, you, unfortunately for you it seems, are the savior of man, the healer of sickness the restorer of sight.”

“Who told you all that?  Was it Peter? Paul? Mary?”

“No, it’s uh,” the good professor shot a look at Sherman for any interjection of support or censure, but received none. “I read it some where.”

“Read…who wrote it? And don’t tell me any of the 12 guys following me around. Those guys wouldn’t cover their heads in the rain unless I beseeched them. God they’re sooo needy!”

Professor Peabody and Sherman were befuddled at Jesus’ seeming antipathy. He was a man in desperate straights; a man trying to avoid the inevitable—his destiny.  But as Professor Peabody and Sherman assured him of his soon historic role in the world, and how people only take from him that which is freely given of him, Jesus noticed Lazarus crying. It was a woeful mourning, a mourning of loss. Being in the midst of salvation and the bounties of the celestial, only to ripped away and forced back to Earth was too much for the man.  He wailed and wiped his runny nose in his palm.  “I didn’t do nothing wrong. Why you do this to me? Why?” 

“I’m sorry.” Jesus said. 

“You should be,” said Lazarus. 

The good professor and Sherman helped Lazarus to his feet, clothed him in the burial shroud once more, and pushed him out the cave and into his new old world. Now he would be forced to reconcile the afterlife with a bunch of people who were searching for meaning without fully knowing the questions they wanted to ask aside from the pedestrian, “So what’s god like?” Or, “Did you get hungry up there?”  Lazarus wanted no parts of redoing his life; he just got used to being dead. 

Jesus remained in the shadows of the tomb, his destiny not his own.  “Should we tell him about his eventual capture beatings, humiliations, the trial, and excruciatingly, blood curdling, painful, scourging and crucifixion?” Sherman asked. 

“No Sherman, no.  We need to go home and never speak of this again.  You see, a man has doubts and fears. That’s what makes having faith so powerful. You fear and you doubt but you remain steadfast.  Jesus needs to find this out for himself.” The good professor once more began rubbing the small of Jesus’ back.  “Lord?”

“Yes dog.”

“I think you need time to yourself.”

“I was thinking just that.”

“Take a month or so to yourself, tell the fellas that you’ll be off on a walk-about of sorts, into the ‘wilderness’ so to speak.”

“So to speak, Professor?” echoed Sherman. 

“Yes,” said Jesus.  “Yes. My wilderness.” He petted the good professor’s head and produced a doggy treat from the very air itself.   “Good idea dog.  Great idea.” 

It's 'bout time we spoke.

This first sentence is killing me!  You know how many first sentences I wrote and deleted only to state the obvious?  About five or six, seven tops.  Why the struggle?  I started with one sentence, all bombastic asshole-like and another making me want to punch a priest in the liver. I opted for the no brainer.  It rings with the air of humility I needed to accept before I ever put pen to paper.  I'm struck with how anachronistic that sounds now, pen to paper.  It's still apt at times, I'm sure. It's not too far gone like the rotary phone or squeezing aluminum foil on the cathode ray tube television antennae.  Pen to paper still works well. Thinkers who need to put their thoughts into words know the poignancy of pen to paper. Artist, and romantics, the pragmatic and unskilled. They know pen to paper, a contrarian wouldn't.  I suppose.

By the way, I know the footstep sounds I hear, late at night, are from my upstairs neighbors. Good people.  Anyway, I know where the sounds are coming from and can rationalize the situation, but damned if the noises don't scare the shit out of me at times.  Almost makes a man wanna sleep with the lights on.