The Turnkey
All are different as clocks from keys, yet the dead have the same time of reckoning. After falling apart, they wait for the turnkey’s summons, when they will rise together. Beneath the rustling of dry leaves, between the wriggling worms, stranded in layers of time the spirits speak.
Those with everlasting faith stay and wait. “He will live up to his promise,” they say. “The turnkey will come and set us free. Eventually.”
Others who cannot believe, do not wait but stay, talking back and forth. “I cannot go on.” “We must go on.” “I cannot go on imprisoned.” “We must go on.”
The young feel downright hoodwinked by the Grim Reaper. They grumble “You can’t count on anything.”
Spirits used to city lights and eat-drink-and-be-merry nights bemoan the deadly boring necropolis with only Barmecide feasts and Tantalus bars. Now and then one yells to an imaginary barkeep, “I could use a really stiff drink.”
A baby in its cradle in the ground is wailing. It’s barely heard now beneath the howling of March winds. Without understanding its ephemeral life in an eternal cage its crying never stops.
The bones of an old man’s fingers clutch at straws of braided hair. “Remember, dear, you gave me this keepsake on our wedding night.” |
