He could sense the dust settling between the folds of his black robe, so he spun upon his toes like a top, and the barely visible debris danced into the dense sunlight like orgies of the unwanted scattering from their dark dens into the white morn. This was his moment, his purpose, this was what he lived for, to lead lost souls back into the light. Some ageless, tuneless tune hummed out through his fat lips as he grabbed with his right hand the leather-bound life preserver, the book that he had been trained to cast out to those adrift and listless folk that lived in a manner of sinking.
He loved the feel of the book�s cracked, worn cowhide. It reminded him of his mother�s skin.
With a dramatic pause for some audience in his mind, he halted in front of the door that would lead him to his conquest. In precognition his thoughts photographed the familiar scene on the other side: the earthy faces filling the pews, the men�s gristle jaws chewing steadily like cows with cud, some forgetting to have removed their hats and picking at teeth gaps with cattail stems, the women in floral dresses that matched the peeling wallpaper of their homes, their paper-plumed fingers fanning their plump faces thoughtlessly – their human wrists devolved to hummingbird shoulders. Children scampered and crawled through tunnels of legs and hymnals. The black-robed man sighed happily and rubbed his left hand across the pleasure of his book cover before stepping out the door.
The scene was just as he knew it would be, and the pew-dwellers bellowed their greetings. The black-robed man leaped to his standing place in front of the pulpit that he never used. And, of course, he didn�t spend much time standing in his standing place, but it was to that point on the platform that he oft returned from his journeys upon the stamped, stained carpet. Raising the book above his head like Moses with the bronze serpent, he unleashed a baritone born to comfort those dying or in labor.
�Do you wish to be saved!�
The men clapped and stomped their feet. The women nodded their heads and waved. The children vanished beneath the seats.
�I say again, do you wish to be saved!�
The mass roared its acknowledgement as if roaring were the only answer. And it was.
Slowly, the man on the platform brought the book down to his waist level. He turned his great body�s side to his people. He exhaled as if a bitter plunger were pushing the air up out of his lungs. His left hand clenched, but his eyes shined. This was his Shakespeare. And then he turned to front the eager crowd and spread his arms and begin the message.
�Then, WHY do you not heed my words? I have told you the signs of the coming glory, and some you have sought out and found. But there are THREE, brothers and sisters, THREE signs that I wish to speak to you of. THREE that you sleep upon this present year, that the greater portion of you have been blind and deaf to! I do exhort you to embrace them and be prepared for the coming glory!�
The men yelled for the signs, dying to right their wrong. The women begged, hoping that the speaker�s instruction would make their husbands nicer. A ragamuffin toddler peak out from between his mother�s shins.
�Please turn to Illogic, Chapter Three. We�ll be reading from verse 17: �And, verily, I say unto you, Celestial Clockwork is one of the most consistent, cohesive, and lyrically brilliant hip-hop albums to come along in the past five years. It has virtually no filler, it�s impeccably sequenced, the beats are ill and varied, and Illogic spills his celestial gift tirelessly on the mic.�� The reading was a sonorous rhythm from those fat lips, an ebb and flow of emphatic syllables. �Perhaps Illogic and Blueprint don�t try to break much new ground, but they succeed where many others have failed. They�ve created an accessible yet artful, intellectual yet spiritual, hip-hop masterpiece.�
Silence stilled the room as its occupants basked in the sweet echo of truth. Grinning, the black-robed man stepped down from the platform and walked down the left aisle. He was carried upon stares of adoration and respect that followed him. Reaching the back of the room, he stopped and spun on his heel.
�Now, if you please, brothers and sisters, turn with me to the Song of Califone, Chapter Seven. Verse 12: �When I awoke, I found myself in a dream not my own. It was the dream of a man with a guitar and a pine bark throat. Like moonshine, I made him ramble and crazy. His many friends joined him, and in an abandoned boxcar they played my story. I was born in England, but I have seen America through a glass darkly.��
�Amen!� cried a lady, this one a creature far too angelic to be seen in the fields with a pitchfork. The black-robed man smiled and bowed his head to her, �Thank you, sister Amanda, it is good to have one who understands.� Then he crossed the span of the room and strolled down the right aisle until he came to the front row of hungry listeners. They knew he was about to feed them their last course.
�Finally, friends, let us look at The Book of Rodan, Chapter One. I�m reading verse 8: �Rodan barely takes a breath or a chance to switch things up, and the beats will probably sound a bit dull to the ears of many heads. Yet, this is a rapper�s rap album. Rodan�s presence on the mic is formidable, brilliant and terrifying. Not unlike a hip-hop angel fallen to earth, a being with scorching black eyes who grasps the microphone like a flaming sword.��
With a resounding slap, the black-robed man let his book clap up like a bear-trap. One, two, three long strides and he stood once more in front of his neglected pulpit, the book raised above his head again as a token of salvation. �Have you heard me today? Have you listened with ears that hear? Shall you inscribe these words upon your heart?�
�Yes! Yes!� The pew-dweller tongues crashed on teeth like waves on rocks.
They were ready now; he would penetrate. �Then, brothers and sisters, bastards and bitches, prepare yourselves for the coming glory! Do not sleep! Love that which is good, hate all else, and live by the Truth that I hold up high in my right hand! Motherfuckers, this is the Word of God!�
A ripping, tearing sound of floorboards dissolving to splinters and the grand piano fell from the attic above to compress the black-robed man with a dissonant note, the ruptured book of mother�s skin giving up its translucent pages to float on the drafts from a hundred hummingbird fans, and all the while the men and women shouting hallelujahs and hosannas, their eyelids clamped shut with fervent zeal. The unwanted children scattered into the brilliant sunlight waiting for them outside.
