Memories jolted in an empty doctor’s waiting room
Back in the old childhood quarter
The quarter where I left my
baby pearls for the tooth fairy;
my second fangs buried in the road for posterity on
landing face first off a bicycle that
momentarily assumed the properties of
a flying machine. My gaffe; donning flip flops
or a cycling race.
The quarter where, on my seventh birthday I tell
an elderly man in a miniature wooden house all
the sins I have committed so far with a
fervent promise that I will try my very best not
to commit any more.
I have an awful lot of sins – venial – apparently, so many,
the priest has to stop me. The penance ticket says
Six Hail Mary’s and three Our Father’s with a Glory Be for good measure.
Clamped to the kneeler I intone the words impervious
to their gist. I go home for tea unburdened of
my most grievous turpitudes. A hollow child cured by
arcane incantations. No excess baggage; certain
of a direct flight to Heaven with no Purgatorial pit stops and
I’m singing all the way
‘Céad míle fáilte romhat, a Íosa a Íosa’
My dazzling soul in God’s keep
If I should die in my blameless sleep.
‘Céad mile, míle fáilte romhat, a Íosa a Íosa’
Three days later, veiled and dressed in white broiderie anglaise as
white as my seven-year-old soul, I receive the white wafer from
the hands of the confessor himself; the
dispenser of Hail Mary’s, Our Father’s and Glory Be’s. It
doesn’t take long for sins to take up squatting rights again
in the hollow girl
One big ‘mortler’ to replace countless venials.
Through wrinkled, puckered lips and sloping eyes, Mother Malevolent,
weighed down with super de-lux crucifix, truncheon and gaoler’s keys
has warned us portentously
‘If the host sacred touches your teeth it’s a mortal sin’
My white shield is now emblazoned with a big M. My tiny mouth
is not up to the job. It may have
condemned me to eternal damnation in the
fiery pits stocked by red hot poker sporting demons
enthusiastically prodding my tender parts to check if
I am cooked; for all eternity I will remain - almost cooked.
The quarter were at ten-years-of-age I become
a soldier of Christ I’d like to be any other kind of soldier but the
they don’t hire girls; girls who make
Our Lady cry every time they
whistle. I kneel before the bishop. He asks me,
‘What is baptism my child?’ Eschewing the official
catechism version I tell it in my own words while Mother Malevolent chews
her own teeth with rage. He, the bishop,
seems happy enough. He also looks like he’ll
be dead within the week. I could be dead before him if
Mother Malevolent has her way.
Today I walk across the road to
the doctor’s surgery with my eighty-seven-year old
Mater. We pass a man helping an elderly lady
from a car. He glances at us longer than he should. As
Mater conducts her business I feel him momentarily
scrutinise me. He asks me am I ‘me’ and I respond
in the affirmative. He tells me we were in
primary school together. Babies, senior infants and first class. I cannot
disagree but am ashamed that I cannot tell him
who he is and that I remember him.
He recalls Mother Malevolent and
glamorous Miss X who went off to be
an air hostess. Mater is astounded and
amused at his recollections
‘Imagine remembering you after fifty years!’
I think, ‘I will keep dying my hair’.
Empty doctors’ waiting rooms have their ghosts.
©Copyright Berni Dwan 2015
Back in the old childhood quarter
The quarter where I left my
baby pearls for the tooth fairy;
my second fangs buried in the road for posterity on
landing face first off a bicycle that
momentarily assumed the properties of
a flying machine. My gaffe; donning flip flops
or a cycling race.
The quarter where, on my seventh birthday I tell
an elderly man in a miniature wooden house all
the sins I have committed so far with a
fervent promise that I will try my very best not
to commit any more.
I have an awful lot of sins – venial – apparently, so many,
the priest has to stop me. The penance ticket says
Six Hail Mary’s and three Our Father’s with a Glory Be for good measure.
Clamped to the kneeler I intone the words impervious
to their gist. I go home for tea unburdened of
my most grievous turpitudes. A hollow child cured by
arcane incantations. No excess baggage; certain
of a direct flight to Heaven with no Purgatorial pit stops and
I’m singing all the way
‘Céad míle fáilte romhat, a Íosa a Íosa’
My dazzling soul in God’s keep
If I should die in my blameless sleep.
‘Céad mile, míle fáilte romhat, a Íosa a Íosa’
Three days later, veiled and dressed in white broiderie anglaise as
white as my seven-year-old soul, I receive the white wafer from
the hands of the confessor himself; the
dispenser of Hail Mary’s, Our Father’s and Glory Be’s. It
doesn’t take long for sins to take up squatting rights again
in the hollow girl
One big ‘mortler’ to replace countless venials.
Through wrinkled, puckered lips and sloping eyes, Mother Malevolent,
weighed down with super de-lux crucifix, truncheon and gaoler’s keys
has warned us portentously
‘If the host sacred touches your teeth it’s a mortal sin’
My white shield is now emblazoned with a big M. My tiny mouth
is not up to the job. It may have
condemned me to eternal damnation in the
fiery pits stocked by red hot poker sporting demons
enthusiastically prodding my tender parts to check if
I am cooked; for all eternity I will remain - almost cooked.
The quarter were at ten-years-of-age I become
a soldier of Christ I’d like to be any other kind of soldier but the
they don’t hire girls; girls who make
Our Lady cry every time they
whistle. I kneel before the bishop. He asks me,
‘What is baptism my child?’ Eschewing the official
catechism version I tell it in my own words while Mother Malevolent chews
her own teeth with rage. He, the bishop,
seems happy enough. He also looks like he’ll
be dead within the week. I could be dead before him if
Mother Malevolent has her way.
Today I walk across the road to
the doctor’s surgery with my eighty-seven-year old
Mater. We pass a man helping an elderly lady
from a car. He glances at us longer than he should. As
Mater conducts her business I feel him momentarily
scrutinise me. He asks me am I ‘me’ and I respond
in the affirmative. He tells me we were in
primary school together. Babies, senior infants and first class. I cannot
disagree but am ashamed that I cannot tell him
who he is and that I remember him.
He recalls Mother Malevolent and
glamorous Miss X who went off to be
an air hostess. Mater is astounded and
amused at his recollections
‘Imagine remembering you after fifty years!’
I think, ‘I will keep dying my hair’.
Empty doctors’ waiting rooms have their ghosts.
©Copyright Berni Dwan 2015
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