Established Marvel : a Monk by Abbreviation

202. WITHERSPOON STREET AND THE SONGS OF GOD:

"You wore a tophat I did not you played cards I hated card-playing you sang songs I disdained the human voice you peppered the marbles in your dungeon I tried to let everything go free..." that was the free-style litany taking place in the basement church of the Little Lamb of the Transfiguration as each person - one after the other - arose to speak what was on their mind and add to the litany while up front in the plastic room some too-wide Divine tried squalor and poverty as a way into God's own palace and though it seemed to cover every poor man's base it really amounted (in my eyes) to nothing their God would be concerned with "you damned the waters I let them flow swiftly you shuttered every window and door I let the wild wind blow through you built houses of cards I erected with bricks and stone you stared at the sky with curses while I wondered amazed at the Heavens you felt the fiery blaze I sought shelter in a lee" and then the Minister arose again in the midst of the room this time and said "brethren I will lift up your spirits I will levitate your hearts and minds to the greater glory of the one great Lord who watches over us and knows our every need and the last day is coming when we shall see Him face to face and learn all his mysterious ways and meanings when the first among us shall be last and the last first and we will all be gathered together again in his presence to feast with the great lamb of God..." and I knew this would just go on and as I looked about me everywhere I realized - as in every other church gathering everywhere - the people were dressed as others they were dressed in the finery which the Devil brings the clothes of office people and style mavens and they bore the attitude of people in fact who were somewhere else or at least wishing to be and the finery hats and suits and clothing befitting what these people proclaimed they were at once more confused me for I could never understand the base dichotomy of people who insist upon looking good while proclaiming their miserable situation and their expectation of deliverance to come - but it is perhaps beside the point - and these Witherspoon denizens of the oldest slave quarters in Princeton seemed no longer to know anything of whence they came nor the truer language of their place and time and station for now it seems EVERYONE wishes to be that which they are not - and in this case as in so many other 'church' cases the dead truly proclaimed that they wished to be 'alive' again - which to my eyes means nothing except that they seek another shot at this earth-life all over again in a different situation.