Prostitutes -- Fiction; United States -- Fiction; Women -- Fiction
“Our Father which art in Heaven ... thy Kingdom ... give us this
day our daily ... not into temptation ... for thine is the Kingdom
... halleluja, Blesst!... the glory for ever and ever ... seek and
ye shall find ... seek seek and and ye ye ... unto you opened ...
unto you, opened ... Blood of the Lamb, red blood, ... there is a
quiet house, all white, where it is warm this bitter Winter night
... all warm a quiet house ... and arms holding me to a redness,
passion, that is allowed. Allowed ... hallowed ... hallowed ...
allowed. Christ smiles on it, his blood is red and holy.... Fanny’s
red, I have seen her red blood. Since I have married her, holy ...
red and holy ... knock and it shall be ... opened ... red warm,
dear ... all white is the blood of the Christ....”
The smokey man was speaking: “Miracle is not dead.”
Harry Luve rolled around upon his face. The music was still. A new
quiet, also warm, wrapped him about. He rolled and rolled in a warm
water. “The quiet is ever’ where.”
His eyes gleamed against a blackness suddenly calm and dun, a wall. He
looked at a wall in a lighted room. He saw a man beside him clad in
black. A hand touched his. Harry was thankful how that hand touched his.
“I have seen,” he said, “ ... O I have seen--“
The hand clasped his. “What, brother, have you seen?”
Harry wrenched away his hands, placed them like fenders before him.
“Let me--let me--!” he stopped. He swayed caught: he flew caught in a
chord that sped with the bright room through a roaring darkness. Roar!
He was dizzy. He tried to cry. He saw his hands speeding before his eyes
like two birds through cavernous space. He stopped from breath ... one
two three four FIVE ... he counted his flying fingers. A tiny spring
sang over his eyes, sang fraying ready to break. He wanted to cry ...
five five!... a little woman flew before his hands like a white bird in
the blackness. Naked. One red spot in her naked body where he had made
red once ... Fanny!... warm ... allowed. _Hallowed allowed hallowed
allowed._ The red spot was a painted house home ... could be about
him.... Blessed are they that mourn ... blessed are they that mourn.
Blessed are the poor in spirit ... comforted ... Kingdom of Heaven lead
us not ... rejoice exceeding glad ... into temptation----
“--_Warm and sweet is the blood of the Lamb
That washes us sinners white.
Sinners sinners
Black and quivering sinners we
And the blood of the Lamb it warms us
It washes us sinners white._”
... The hand of the man in black touched his again. Smokey ... flame.
Warmness, red warmness, white from hallowedness. The tiny spring burst.
His eyes burst out into myriad diamond stars. A sluice opened. He was
all wet. His soul poured ... a pent torrent ... out: speechless
whiteness.
“Something--say something, Brother! What wrestles in you? What chokes
you? What do you see?”
“Christ!” gasped Harry Rowland Luve: then he slept.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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