December

Issue 51

Post-rapture, a show of hands is all it takes to weed out the spurious from the genuine; as I walk the long line of men and women, so many in their antiquated clothes (let us be frank— when it comes to body-piercing, crucifixion is so yesterday) my angelic scribe tallies the yesses, nos, and near misses. One creative type—here, maimed by similar hazing rituals, they all call each other "saint," as if members of the same college fraternity—has painted a smiley face in the blood of each palm. He's a no. Another still clutches the still-embedded nails, like a shrike self-impaled upon thorns. Another no. Hello, Lord, says a woman, peeking through both holes. No, I'm afraid not. And so on and so forth. In frustration I'm about to call it a day when near the end, I see a milk-faced boy; he's a little on the ragamuffin side, to be sure, with a picked-upon, kicked-to-the-curb look; but apart from a few smudges of dirt on his hands, they're clean and unbroken. Only his spiked wrists bear the gauntlets of blood. Come, brother, I say.