The crematorium was on a hillside by the
river, near the edge of town. As we came
up through the gates smoke was trailing from the stack and people were coming
out from the last funeral. I took a
final opportunity to self-medicate, threw the bottle on the seat and felt for
the exit.
We formed up by the hearse. It was a nice day. Dog hustled the McFatters' flowers into the
hall and the rest of us slow-marched up the stairs behind the casket. Inside, the attendant was clearing away the
wreaths from the previous party.
I let the flock sort itself out as best it
could, trod water in the direction of the pulpit and hauled myself up the
steps. It was high up there. I hooked an arm over the lectern and hung
helplessly while the movers set the casket on the runway. They filed into a back pew, and waited.
The place was full. The congregation shifted and grew silent
under my limp-marionette stare.
Catholics, Presbyterians, New Revelationists, barflies. This would take some tact, and I was so
snookered I'd have to make my mouth move with my hand.
I dragged myself up straight and swayed
domineeringly.
"Friends!" I called.
"Mourners!
"Fellow mortals!
"Another of us—yes, another of
us—has gone on.
"Our brother—
"Our brother—"
Fuck was the guy's name?
"—Hemhold!
"has departed.
"There he is. There, but gone. In the bloom of his youth, at the height of
his probing curiosity (how we'll miss it!): gone."
We turned our heads and contemplated the
crate.
I had begun.
If you are experienced in these matters you will know that holding forth
in public is like peeing when somebody's watching you: it's hard to get
going. But, like peeing when somebody's
watching you, it’s easy once you get started.
"We don't know where. Or how.
"Whether through coercion,
through falling in with bad companions!"
I glared at the blue-suiters.
Silence.
Sniffing.
"Whether because, fed up with grasping
at the ineffable mystery of life—terms, after all, on which anyone might
reasonably refuse to live—he finally ran screaming off into the only desert
that, at that crucial moment, offered itself!
"Or whether he had simply made his quota
for this trip and was called back to the office;
"We shall, perhaps, in this mortal
state, never know."
I bowed my head. The lectern slipped under my weight and
almost pitched me into the pews. I
danced with it.
"But why?" I demanded,
lunging with the momentum. "Why?" These things have a certain form.
"Why? Why this final reduction to steaming
mulch? Why do we have to be ants
on the sidewalk while Death stomps by in hard shoes? Why do we get dumped on?
"Because this is you here, sweetheart! Try to face
it!"
"AMEN!" cried the brothers and sisters.
I gave them a curt glance and seized back the
initiative.
"Why?
Tell me! Do we spend our
lives waiting around for next year's models to come out just to be another
streak in the garbage chute?
"Why? Is this supposed to be some kind of learning
experience? Are you learning
anything?
"Why? What are our feelings here today? Are we sad he's gone? Glad he's off the flytape? Should we celebrate his release from the
cosmic detention camp? Rend our garments? Shrug it off?
"Maybe—maybe he's just changing
trains! Maybe this is just another stop
in the Total Transit System! Maybe he'll
have to go through all this again, re-learn the holds!
"Maybe he was in it for the
anxiety! Maybe we're all adventurers
here and Scottie has just beamed another one of us up!
"Or maybe, how about this, maybe our
profoundest intuition is true, and this really is a movie! The camera behind the mirror, all your sordid
little outtakes.
"I really feel that way,
sometimesl
"Or do you prefer zeroism? Are we mere spurious nothings after all? Neurotic monkeys fingering our fur for nits
of Neverland? Certainly there are lesser
consolations.
"I mean what do you know about this,
really? If in some later phase a being
of another order asks you what life here was even like, what are you
going to tell it? Do you have idea one?
"You might I suppose enumerate some of
the pros and cons. Avocado vinaigrette,
say, as opposed to being thrown on the mercy of whatever happens. Almond paste, over against the horror-movie
music that passes as avant-garde."
I was letting it all out.
"Because what else can you say?
The head tells you it's all random, the heart tells you it's not and the
generator is too busy to think about it.
We are caught between the ding and the dong of the dialectic,
ambivalence the very law of life, for it is inherent in this system, in
this particular system, that there is no system, inconsistency is a principle
of the system, each new formula a liberation from the last, everybody’s
got something to sell, and it's nice, oh, it's so nice when we
find something we can stay with for a while—Nabokov, Letterman, Crest—but we
move on, we move on, upping the ante with each success, with each defeat, it
doesn't matter, put in on this number, stabilize here, but on we
go, grabbing at an illumination that can only come when we have exhausted
everything, though we never do, we know we never will, it's all there to keep
us moving, keep us interested, distract us perhaps, from the crushing
conviction that God in his Infinite Boredom broke himself into a trillion us
just to have somebody to talk to!
But this too is a contortion, life is a series of
contortions, pushing us into every possible position, having us every
way it can think of, and even when we lie there, sated and sore, we are still
sealed in, still have no clue what's next, our ignorance so seamless as
to suggest a law in ambush, another law, the corollary to The Law, inscribed in
stone over the exit sign: YOU DON'T KNOW SQUAT!"
I put my fist on my hip and held the lectern.
"REMEMBER that the next time you are
TEMPTED towards an OPINION!"
There was no sound. Even the brute looked worried.
I smiled.
"But the Deity mutters, Our servant is
grown useless. He no longer hurls himself
upon the contradictions.
"And what, then, of God?"
I folded my hands and leaned on my elbows.
"What of the Creator?
"Of course we can form no adequate idea
there, but we have to organize our twitching somehow! Shall we call him a Father?
"You are perhaps one of those who insist
that he is a Mother, and there have been many, but the current texts have it
down as Father so, unless you are convinced that the woman's movement is going
to alter the punchline of the cosmic joke, let's go with Father for the moment.
"Now, what do we know about
fathers?
"Well, one, they know
everything. The world, themselves. You.
They know infinitely more than you do, so don't even try.
"Two, they love you more than you love
them, and are not above saying so. Which
can make you feel like poopoo.
"Three, they can do anything.
"Four, but they don't. It's a big day if they show a little
approval. Of course they help you
and everything, but only when they think you need it, which doesn't
always coincide with your feelings on the thing. Mainly they want you to fix it with Magic
Marker and get on with it.
"Five, they'd better be there! But they're not. Especially when your car is being
repossessed."
I admired my fingernails.
"So that's the name of that tune.
"Now: where does that leave you?"
I gripped the pulpit and glared around.
"What is left, when the props have been
kicked away, of the perplexed and quivering wretch that is you?"
I chuckled and shook my head at myself.
"YOU CLOWN!" I screamed,
leaping forward, the pulpit in a headlock.
"YOU OAF! You've never KNOWN anything in your LIFE, HAVE
you? Oh, you've known PAIN, sure, but
any DONKEY knows PAIN, am I riqht?"
"AMEN!" said the brothers
and sisters. I gave them a
this-is-absolutely-your-last-warning look.
"You should SEE yourself alone in the
dark, SHIVERING before enigma. Your own EXISTENCE fills you with terror. You don't know what you've done wrong to
bring it upon you, but you figure as long as you know remorse now, maybe you
won't have to WORRY! In the long run
it's probably safest to despise yourself. Which is no problem anyway.
"In the morning you blink warily in the
bathroom. You feel your body for new
lumps. Will the shaving cream
explode? How are your teeth?
"Not until you have emerged into the
mercy of daylight do you march around surveying the other destinies, yawning
with a closed mouth through your dealings with them, saying, You are
essentially unworthy, and you are essentially unworthy.
"By evening, you will be leaping about
like a lord, consorting with tartlets, sucking Jack Daniels from a bottle with
a nipple.
"It is a whoredom!
"Do you give one thought to restraint? No!
You want it oral, you want it anal, you want it genital
and you want it now!
"YOU PIG!" I came forward and shot my finger at
them. "And you want ME to
FORGIVE you?"
The silence was tremulous.
I breathed angrily.
"Well, indulge, baby. Lay your trail of waste through the
world. Belch as you rut! SOONER OR LATER! SOONER OR LATER, THE BOAT'S GONNA ROCK! YOU'RE MY CUSTOMER, SOONER OR LATER!"
My eyes fell on Joe France.
"Of course, not YOU! No, no," I sneered, "not YOU! ADD IT UP YOURSELF, SWEETHEART! One of these days, the BOX, the FLAMES.”
A mafioso coughed discreetly.
I threw myself at him. "DO NOT TRY TO SAVE YOURSELF!
"SUBMIT!"
I had dropped to my knees. Righteously, I looked them over. No one met my gaze.
I got to my feet and lay my forearms on the
lectern.
"Now," I whispered. "What are you going to do about it?
"Is there anything you can do
about it?
"Is there?"
Sniffing.
Recrossing of legs.
"Well, yes, friends. There is.
"You can TOTALLY REORGANIZE!
"You can get going on a COMPREHENSIVE
PROGRAM of REGULAR DAILY IMPROVEMENT!
Start living your life according to TENABLE PRINCIPLES!
"RIGHT TODAY!
"Or, you can continue pacing the
prison yard of your unregenerate self, it doesn't matter to me. All I
can do is guide you, suffer with you.
"For some time now, I have been gone
from your miserable midst, sojourning in the realm of the dead. This will testify that I have not failed to
come back down the mountain and help you with your life. Serve out my stint in the slums of the
spirit.
"But it won't be easy! You can't just lift a smoking beaker to your
lips and become somebody else!
You have to really want it!
"And YOU DON'T!"
I turned my face from the futility of it all.
"But, just in case you find the courage
to change, here are a few do's and don'ts.
"First, don't get all depressed. No
doubt you are convinced that your life is contaminated by a more than usual
share of error. Maybe it is. You have sinned, I know that. You are lost in darkness and solitude, afraid
for you very soul.
"Watch television, or something. If it means that much to you, you can always
commit suicide. Big deal.
"Yes, yes, we are sucked down the drain
of physical disintegration. So? Don't just sit there and fret! The young are out there, manically exchanging
the new information! The dog gets what
he can! I mean, this is like, you know,
life!
"Remember, even when the last drip drop
of despair has echoed in the emptiness, we can still get a fourth for bridge!
"And: don't worry about photographs of
yourself. You don't look like that.
"Second, don't be one of those jerks who
won't get out of the taxi until Bolero's over. Nobody likes that.
"Third, try not to lick your chapped
lips when you’re passing women in the street.
They get the wrong idea. Well,
not the wrong idea, but you know.
"Fourth, and apropos of this last, seize
the shield of faith against sexual allurements.
And if that doesn't work, don't forget your little rubber suit, or
you'll get into all kinds of trouble.
Including support payments.
"Girls! Smarten up!
Cut that stuff out!"
I stared them down.
"Fifth, and here's the big one, don't
not want. There are many who would teach
us not to want. Wanting, they say, is
the whole problem.
"Now: no. These people are usually from the East, which
is a mistake, anyway. I mean you can't
just sit there and go all googie! And,
as the employment of right reason should tell you, wanting not to want is wanting
something!
"So go ahead.
"Now, what do we want? That is the question over which we should
fast and meditate.
"Slave girls?
"Discipline? You could become a vegetarian, eat a turnip.
"Love?"
Love.
I drifted away. My soul floated out over the
faithful.
When I snapped to they were all looking up at
me, waiting.
"It's the only thing," I murmured,
"that can ease your ambivalence.
That, and—"
We looked at the casket.
"Well that's my interpretation,
anyway, you can think what you want.
"Through God's will and grace,
"Ahmen. "
"Ahmen," they answered.
I reached under the banister and pressed the
button. The conveyor belt hummed to life
and carried the coffin along like a canoe to the rapids. As it passed under the flap the hall filled
with the tolling of tape-recorded bells.
Beneath us the propane rumbled like the
stomach of an all consuming power. There
would be no flames in the oven: the heat was so intense there wouldn't even be
ashes, just bones that would be fed through the grinder. Afterwards the clients would be presented
with half a shoebox of fish tank gravel.
Easy to divide up, anyway.
I lowered my eyes, hands folded on the
lectern.
Suddenly I was lying on the floor. That didn't seem too strange. I had wanted to maintain a dignified
solemnity but what the hell, I'd done what I could.
But there was a pressure in the room that
unscrambled as a loud sound! An explosion!
I hauled myself up to the banister. The flap fell in flaming tatters and fire
crackled along the runway. Hell
was reaching out for the living!
I didn't really understand!
Then, Oh,
no. The coffin! It was supposed to be cork or chipboard! It must have been fiberglass! We should have unscrewed the cremation
plug! Who had time to check?
Oh, gee.
Nothing makes a bang like your airtight fiberglass! You do get them with pacemakers. Hospital forgets to tell you the guy's wired,
he blows the oven flat. But this was
bigger!
Not that there was any danger. Unless maybe the flames should reach the gas
reservoir.
I thought it through again, and turned to the
congregation. "Time to leave,"
I smiled.
They were already heaving at the door,
screaming and swimming over one another, clawing each other down. Smoke hung in strata. The bells were out of control.
To set an example of calm in a crisis I
lowered my way down from the pulpit and pedaled slowly towards the mob, smiling
serenely at whoever looked around. The
woodwork was starting to steam. They
were draining like salt in an egg timer.
When I finally saw some daylight I launched
myself forward with such force that I found myself on my hands and knees. Which seemed to be working. I decided to stay in that mode until I had
time to rethink it.
There was no trouble until I got outside to
the steps. Then I lost it. You may know this from your own experience
but, if you're going to crawl downstairs, you have to remember always to crawl
backwards. Never forward. Forward going up, backwards coming down.
I forgot.
Fortunately for my dignity however the
propane tank went up just at that moment and I seemed to the onlookers—for
people from the next funeral were standing around watching—not to be
falling-down drunk but to be blown keel over crow’s nest by the blast. Which, who knows.
They picked me up and felt my bones, made me
wiggle my digits, stare at a moving finger.
When I could balance I wobbled over and stood on the grass with the
flock—torn clothes, charred faces—and watched the roof burn.
Robert MacLean is a bad poet and an independent filmmaker. His The Light Touch is on Amazon Prime, Tubi, Scanbox and YouTube, and his 7-minute comedy is an out-loud laugh. He is also a screamingly funny novelist, a playwright, a blogger, a YouTuber, a reviewer of films, a literary critic, and a stand-up comic poet. Born Toronto, PhD McGill, taught at Canadian universities, too cold, lives Greece, Irish citizen. He is of towering intellect but, as is often the case with such people, not that bright. Here’s more on this splendid fellow. 
