The day Dejesus left for good he wrapped his mamma’s Bible in sac-cloth, shoetied it with pickling string, heaved his worldly belongings over his shoulder (a toothbrush, two pairs of slip-on loafers, a piece paper on which was written tuba and abut, four mousetraps, a crab-net and his haberdashery) and made quick for the front door, his dear mamma wailing after him ‘…where do you think you’re going?’ the neighbor’s dog running its wormy ass up and down the laneway, the sky blacker than roof-pitch and yesterday’s hate. The day the Witness left home for good he stole his mamma’s best dress, the fancy one with pinking and frills, and high-tailed it to the tool-shed, where he stayed eating dog-nuts and candy until his da found him two days later.
In the town of Skjeberg Ostfold a boy with a stick stirred up a hornets’ nest, his little sister, who was by his side, stung until she fell faint of life. In Rigaud along the river St. Albert de Felecia a boy with a hornet’s nest hat fell to his knees and prayed to the sky, his face swollen beyond all recognition. On a side-street in Bombay Maharashtra a boy with bowed legs begged for rotten fruit under a sky blacker hate. Behind the Vastra Gotaland grocer’s in the village of Hjo a boy with red-russet-red cheeks met a man who claimed to be the voice of God, his fancy dress soiled with grease and yesterday’s lies.
Dejesus met the Witness who met the harridan who met the shamble leg man who met the legless man who met the harridan’s sister who met the Seder grocer who met the man in the hat one sunny afternoon in early June, the warm summer sky thick with bluebottles and shadflies, the legless man hipping and hopping, the shamble leg man skipping and cavorting, the Seder grocer jumping and jaunting, the harridan tripping and toppling, her sister leaping, Dejesus dodging and diving, the Witness wiling and willowing, the man in the hat sitting quietly in thought, his flatcar cap on the fop of his lap, the day half-over yet barely begun.
In the town of Skjeberg Ostfold a boy with a stick stirred up a hornets’ nest, his little sister, who was by his side, stung until she fell faint of life. In Rigaud along the river St. Albert de Felecia a boy with a hornet’s nest hat fell to his knees and prayed to the sky, his face swollen beyond all recognition. On a side-street in Bombay Maharashtra a boy with bowed legs begged for rotten fruit under a sky blacker hate. Behind the Vastra Gotaland grocer’s in the village of Hjo a boy with red-russet-red cheeks met a man who claimed to be the voice of God, his fancy dress soiled with grease and yesterday’s lies.
Dejesus met the Witness who met the harridan who met the shamble leg man who met the legless man who met the harridan’s sister who met the Seder grocer who met the man in the hat one sunny afternoon in early June, the warm summer sky thick with bluebottles and shadflies, the legless man hipping and hopping, the shamble leg man skipping and cavorting, the Seder grocer jumping and jaunting, the harridan tripping and toppling, her sister leaping, Dejesus dodging and diving, the Witness wiling and willowing, the man in the hat sitting quietly in thought, his flatcar cap on the fop of his lap, the day half-over yet barely begun.
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