Lamar Howell's Weblog

Something insidious must have put us to sleep

Droned on and on till we unknowingly fell somnambulant

Surely it came with a humming

A vibration

A disturbance less than a tremor

I know—it was stealth!

A clandestine break-in upon consciousness

Some miscreant, bent on capturing alertness

The first to fall was the sexton in the bell tower

Drowsed by watching the rope swinging in the warm breeze

Next the parson dozed

And the parishioners slumbered

Prayers, which began as a stirred and stirring cacophony

Cooled into responsive reading,

Then chilled into a liturgy

and finally, jelled into contemplation

The loud, jarring, white-water oomph of dissonant heart cries

Slowed into a hallowed swirl of codified praise

And stopped in a wide sea of whispered calm

The doors of the church creaked shut

As the walls began to close in

We feverishly colored the windows with

Wan pleasantries

Pale wishes, and

Pastel memories

Oh, bordered with lead

We all synchronized our watches

Pressed the alarms switch off

And climbed into safe, sterile body bubbles

From a voice recorder came

a Psalmodic instruction:

“When the craft reaches heaven

The suspended-animation chambers

Will automatically decompress”