Myles Crawford

As it was the end of the feasting season and the churches were preparing for winter bible studies and no one within earshot, no matter how they strained, could hear the bells clanging in the belltower and as the sky was gray bitter, the clouds corralled against the horizon, and no one save for the street sweeper, who was up and about tending to his sweeping duties, duties he took great pride and satisfaction in, and no one knew what time it was because the clock in the clocktower had stopped ticking, the hands having detached from the face, and the vergers had put the anointing ciborium away, placing it on the topmost shelf behind the altar, no one save for the street sweeper knew what to do, save for dream of next year’s feasts and the red-faced look on the rector’s assistant as he thought up new ways to get the attention of the young curly-haired boy who every Sunday sat ramrod straight in the first pew facing the altar box. That day the sun set 2 hours earlier than usual, falling from the sky like a fiery bird.

“Myles Crawford appeared on the steps, his hat aureoling his scarlet face…” (Ulysses James Aloysius Joyce). He awoke with a start, his legs choked in bed linen. Looking up across the wall to the ceiling he noticed the plaster flaking at the corner, a gray water stain making a seam with the ceiling lamp. ‘everything is everything…’ he mused. Thoughts brought to mind other thoughts, the old woman with the spoiled apple face, the smell of damp clothing and bräken lye, his da’s starched shirts, the elbows table-shined, things, that were he not abed staring at the ceiling, would surely not find their way into his thoughts.