Drinking

X and I sit in the afternoon sun drinking. Drink, he tells me, keep up. Why are we drinking? I ask. To be renewed, he says, because it’s spring. Is it working for you? I ask him some time later. No, he says, keep going.

Dusk dread

Dusk is my time of dread, I tell X, my dread time. Yours too, I think? This darkening holding pattern… it’s not a time at all, really, I say. It’s time stopped or winding down with no certainty of starting again – how do we know it will? Dead time, a hole in time that demands: What have you done with your time today? Now, when you should have earned the time to relax, what have you done with the time that was given to you? And tomorrow, if tomorrow comes, what will you do, how will you honour the gift that tomorrow will be, if it comes? Do you know what awaits you? And the answer it gives us is always nothing, isn’t it? I say. You’ve done nothing, you’ll do nothing, nothing awaits you. That’s why dusk is our time, I say, that’s why we dread it.

Thief in the night

If salvation comes it will come like a stranger, I say, unannounced and unknown, while we sleep, like a thief in the night. Yes, says X, if it were to come that’s how it would have to come. But would we wake up? he says.

Unquenchable fire

‘Unquenchable fire.’ Do you feel the mystery and terror in those words? I ask X. An eternal fire, which must mean an eternal sacrifice, what could be more just for the likes of us? But how can we even speak of such a thing? I say. You’re the one who’s talking, says X.

As clear as it gets

I read to X from the Bible: ‘His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire.’ That’s as clear as it gets, I tell him, there you have it. Even Christ said it. There’s no getting away from it, I say. We need to figure out once and for all what our real work is. You need to stop talking once and for all, says X.

Overdue

So what have you accomplished today? X asks me when I get home from work. I don’t know, I say, slumping down opposite him. What’s our real work? I ask after a while. I don’t know, he says. Something’s overdue, I say, I can feel it, we’ve missed some crucial deadline and I can’t remember when it was or what I was supposed to do, I only know a judgement’s coming down on us, like in a nightmare. Only from this nightmare there’s no waking up, and it’s only going to get worse unless we… unless we what? I say. What’s our real work? I say. I don’t know, says X.

The harvest is now

The harvest is now, I tell X, the world is ready, more than ready, it’s groaning under its readiness. Time too is ripe, over-ripe, time itself is rotting away. What’s left of the rotting wheat is being sorted from the rotting chaff. Do you want to be the wheat or the chaff? Do you want to help me or do you want to perish? Without your help I’ll perish too, I say. Are there words for this degree of hypocrisy? says X.

I’m going to work

I’m going to work, I tell X. Fine, he says, I’m staying here. Don’t look at me like that, he says. If you think you’re better than me, you’re wrong. I’m going to work, I tell X. You think that’s work? he says. I’m going to work, I tell X. I’ll be here when you get back, he says. I’m going to work, I tell X. Don’t look at me like that, he says. You think it’s easy sitting in this chair all day? You do, don’t you? I’m going to work, I tell X. Suit yourself, he says. I’m going to work, I tell X. You want a medal? he says. I’m going to work, I tell X. Go then, he says. Which one of us is free? I ask him when I get home. Neither, he says. But I’m less unfree than you, he says. Sometimes, sitting here, I manage it, I don’t know how. Manage what? I ask. To be free, he says. How do you do it? I ask. I said I don’t know, he says. How do you think you do it? I ask. By being as unlike you as I can, he says.

The time is ripe

We need to prepare ourselves for the Judgement, I tell X, can you help me with that at least? All the signs are there, it’s coming, it’s already here, it’s overtaken us. We’re like the virgins without the candles, or however the saying goes, I say. It’s time for you to step up and join me at the threshold, I say, the time is ripe. I know you, says X, you’d be the one without the candle, you’d be too frightened. You’d join the crowds when you could, you’d back away the minute the cock crowed.

Judgement and revolution

A judgement is coming, I tell X. There can only be so much sin without a judgement. But even a judgement isn’t enough, perhaps it’s already here… What’s needed is an apocalypse, I say, a great fire of the spirit! A revolution too may be coming, may be in the air, but that too will only be a beginning, the merest of beginnings, waiting for us to begin… The true Judgement, accompanied by the true Revolution, will be the beginning of the end, I say, the real end at last, the end that shakes and burns and transfigures everything. Oh when will it come, that end! I say. But it’s got to be something completely different from us, says X, you do realise that, don’t you? That’s the only way we’ll be saved, that’s the only way it won’t end in tears. Revolution! What a joke, he says. But the Judgement is coming, you’re right about that much, he says, in fact it’s already here.