{"id":209847,"date":"2022-04-25T12:00:07","date_gmt":"2022-04-25T11:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=209847"},"modified":"2022-04-21T05:06:43","modified_gmt":"2022-04-21T04:06:43","slug":"three-for-the-apocalypse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2022\/04\/three-for-the-apocalypse\/","title":{"rendered":"Three for the Apocalypse"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

White Owl in Flight by Roy Rimmer<\/p><\/div>\n

1.<\/strong><\/p>\n

A Jew, a Christian and a Muslim are sitting around arguing the merits of their respective religions.<\/em><\/p>\n

The Christian says, \u201cIn\u00a0my<\/em>\u00a0religion, the Messiah is coming for the second time.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Muslim says, \u201cIn\u00a0my<\/em>\u00a0religion, the Messenger has come and departed.\u201d<\/p>\n

There is an awkward, palpable silence\u2026. They all look at each other, daggers in their eyes, then shout in unison: \u201cThat\u2019s the dumbest thing I\u2019ve ever heard!\u00a0 Stop thinking like that or I\u2019ll kill you!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a02.<\/strong><\/p>\n

God calls Father Abraham into His Pearly Chambers.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cAbe,\u201d says God, \u201cLook at your squabbling children.\u2026 I\u2019ve a good mind to put an end to it all, to send down meteors, plagues and famine. I\u2019ll unleash the whirlwind everywhere.\u00a0 Fire and ice together!\u201d<\/p>\n

Father Abraham throws up his arms. \u00a0\u201cAren\u2019t we made in Your image, Lord?\u00a0 Aren\u2019t we your progeny?\u201d<\/p>\n

God looks into Abraham\u2019s eyes and He sees Himself reflected: In one eye he sees the murderers of children, hands red with puerile blood; in the same eye, He sees vultures circling the air, waiting for an emaciated Afghan child to die next to a garbage heap.\u00a0 And, in the other, He sees children playing in a field of lavender.\u00a0 And He sees healthy children of the poor, in school, in neatly creased uniforms\u2014clean and attentive, curious and happy.<\/p>\n

\u201cGo,\u201d says God, stroking his cloudy chin. \u201cI must think on this further.\u00a0 Perhaps I, too, am evolving….\u201d<\/p>\n

3.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Winking Owl<\/p><\/div>\n

Sometime after Armageddon, on a moon-filled night, an owl and a gator reminisce.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cWhat ever happened to the ape-beings–\u201d asks the gator, \u201cthe chimp-men?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWho?\u201d asks the owl.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe ones who were always squabbling!\u00a0 The ones who were always howling!\u00a0 They howled in the sky and howled in the water, their chattering motors stirring things up! \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Everywhere they went\u2014dust and noise, gas and pollution!\u00a0 A very dirty, chattering crew!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cGone,\u201d says the owl. \u201cSelf-chattered out.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHow \u2018bout that\u2026!\u201d \u00a0The gator blows air through his teeth.\u00a0 He makes a deep rumbling in his belly, which causes the water on his spiked, rippled back to sputter and rise in little ejections, exciting the females nearby. \u00a0\u201cThey couldn\u2019t have been very smart,\u201d he muses. \u00a0\u201cA hundred million years, I\u2019ve lived in the waters, making lazy \u2018s\u2019s,\u201d<\/em> watching the sun and the moon and stars.\u00a0 Sometimes I lie in the sun and warm myself contentedly.\u00a0 If I get bored, a pretty gator swishes her tail at me\u2026. I\u2019ve plenty to think about.\u00a0 But it all takes time\u2026. It seems only yesterday\u2026 those noisy ones clamored out of the trees.\u00a0 Now you say they\u2019re gone?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAll gone,\u201d says the owl. \u00a0\u201cAll clamored out.\u201d<\/p>\n

The gator bellows at the moon. The owl winks.<\/p>\n

\u201cBefore you swam in the waters,\u201d says the owl, \u201cI shed my scales and feathered my wings\u2026. Mighty Tyrannosaurus fell to his knees, transformed himself to oil\u2026. I watched\u2026 I waited\u2026.\u00a0 Night after night, perched on a branch, dreaming, remembering, waiting\u2026 waiting\u2026.\u00a0 Always, a sweet, considerate mouse would offer its life to me.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0Earth provides and abides.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBut why did they die?\u201d asks the gator. \u00a0(He was always the most curious one in his school!)<\/p>\n

\u201cWho?\u201d coos the owl.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe racketeers\u2026. The clamorers.\u201d<\/p>\n

The old owl shrugs. \u00a0\u201cQuestions, questions!\u201d he complains. \u201cThey were an experiment who took themselves too seriously!\u00a0 A path among a myriad\u2026.\u00a0 Always impatient.\u00a0 Always insistent\u2014insistent on\u00a0their\u00a0<\/em>ways,\u00a0their\u00a0<\/em>truths. \u00a0They made God in their image, then suffered the consequences.\u201d \u00a0He winks one eye, rotates his head like a dial. \u00a0\u201cSome say it was their opposable thumb\u2026. It helped them grab more than they needed.\u201d<\/p>\n

A cloud drifts across the golden harvest moon, held in a beard of Spanish moss, its light reflected in a dragonfly\u2019s eye.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I had such a thumb,\u201d says the gator, \u201cI\u2019d hold my ideals more firmly.\u00a0 I wouldn\u2019t let them slip away.\u201d<\/p>\n

The owl shrugs.<\/p>\n

The gator slithers across the mud, finds a small fold in the water, slips himself noiselessly under.\u00a0 He rumbles\u2014and the water dances off his back\u2014a symphonette of timpani and bassoons.\u00a0 He rises again with an afterthought\u2026.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were some good ones, I suppose,\u201d he says. \u00a0\u201cThere are usually some good ones. Even the meanest creatures\u2014even the mice feed their children, let them snuggle tenderly\u2026.\u00a0 What about them?…<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat about\u00a0them<\/em>?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWho?\u201d says the owl\u2026.<\/p>\n

________________________________________<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> Gary Steven Corseri\u00a0is a member of the\u00a0<\/em>TRANSCEND Network for Peace Development Environment.<\/em><\/strong><\/a>\u00a0 He is the grandson of Ukrainian-Jewish and Sicilian-Catholic immigrants.\u00a0 Gary has performed his poems at the Carter Presidential Library and his dramas have been produced on\u00a0<\/em>PBS-Atlanta and in universities, high schools and Little Theaters.\u00a0 He has published 2 novels, 1 full collection and 1 prize-winning chapbook of poems.\u00a0 His poems, articles, fiction and dramas have appeared in hundreds of global publications & websites, including:\u00a0 <\/em>Countercurrents, Village Voice, Redbook Magazine, The Miami Herald, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The New York Times,\u00a0and\u00a0<\/em>Transcend Media Service<\/strong><\/a>.\u00a0 He has taught at universities in the U.S. and Japan, and in US prisons and public schools.\u00a0 He has worked as a grape-picker in Australia, a gas-station attendant, and an editor. Contact:\u00a0<\/em>garyscorseri@gmail.com<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Jew, a Christian and a Muslim are sitting around arguing the merits of their respective religions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":209849,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[1177,107],"class_list":["post-209847","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-transcend-members","tag-inspirational","tag-religion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209847","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=209847"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209847\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/209849"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=209847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=209847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=209847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}