There is a roar of flame,
explosions, scorched faces, screeches, and crumbling buildings. Now
a corner, now a brick, the structure is caving in upon itself. There
is blood and limbs strewn in the streets. Black angels are soaring
and beneath them thousands of poisoned birds, falling, exploding upon us.
The cement is trembling. I am falling, falling down endless stairs.
There is no way out of the building, it is so high. The earth cracks
asunder and a misty yellow flower unfolds between the melting asphalt.
“Samuel, Samuel!’ There is darkness. I am sweaty
and hot and brush the damp hair from my eyes.
“Sam, what’d you dream?’
‘Alex?’
The flower is so real. I want to pluck it and
soothe the scorched faces but there is only a scratchy blanket and gentle
humming of the engine. I breathe deep of the stale ship air.
Alex is looking at me. His eyes are glassy and so blue.
‘Hey no fear big fella’. I tousle his mop of
blond hair and turn to the wall for the vibrating engines and their soothing
wakefulness.
“Sammie, Sam, Sam!’’ it is brilliant daylight and
sharp stinging air.
‘Catch me Alex, catch me if you can!’ It’s just
the two of us and the green meadow. The football is soaring.
Now to Dad, now to me. Mom is there, her
blond hair lifting on the wind. I trip on something
or other and they’re all on top of me, Dad playing gorilla, Alex shrieking,
and the dog.
Was Dad who woke me up this time. He was here
to say what I already knew. Darn him. Why now, at the best
part of the dream. For a moment there is still that memory of a good
feeling. Solid ground beneath my
feet.
‘…It’s not up to me, son’
Alex is curled up in his blanket, sucking his thumb
and Dad is perched upon my bed.
‘We will go back to earth, but we don’t have to stay.’
‘The hell with it Dad’ I jerk up. ‘ I don’t
wanna see it. It’s all gone except for a bunch of sick survivors!’
‘Well they’ll be living on their own colonies.
Don’t see how it’ll bother you, young man, to save a few lives’ Dad gets
up, jerks the captains uniform around him and strides out.
‘You don’t think he means Mom, do you Sam?’
I can’t handle the little guy just now. ‘Hey where you going? What
about Mom?’ It occurs to me that I’ve slept in my clothes and they are
stale and creased.
‘Oh shut up about Mom’ I mutter clambering over his
pudgy form.
The ship is cramped for space and it shouldn’t be
hard to find singing Johnson, the old loony, and have him tell me a thing
or two about the dream.
Johnson is there all right, spread over a chair in
the dining area. On the table rests the battered banjo that never
leaves his side. The fellow’s hair is all
tufts of white and he’s in the throes of a killer
headache, small wonder why.
‘You got to stop drinking man’ I straddle the bench
beside him.
‘It’s been hurtin ever since we left port.’
‘Yea’ I’m feeling merciless today. ‘And
it doesn’t help getting intoxicated’ Jackson goes a little red.
‘You ain’t lost a no one, little twit. I have
a sister, a nephie and my home back there’
‘And I’m an alien, right? Look Johnson, I had a dream
last night’
The dining area begins to fill with crew members and
passengers but Johnnie is paying no attention. He’s all ears now.
I talk for a while, rattle on for some twenty minutes.
‘Yellow flower’ Johnnie’s blue eyes turn inward.
‘Is a sign, Sammie boy! You gotta return to the forsaken planet and
spread hope, like the other holy passengers ‘board this rig. He gets
up on a chair and gestures to a group of nuns drinking coffee in the corner.
“My good women, Samuel has had a sign!” The nuns sigh
and drag their chairs to face the walls.
‘Stupid critters, them all.’ Johnson clambers clumsily
to his seat.
‘Look man, seriously.’ I refuse to cry.
Why can’t this idiot explain it all and make the dread go away? I don’t
like the look on Johnson’s face. There’s the
disturbing feeling that he’s not drunk anymore.
‘I start to realize son, there’s a heck of a lot I
don’t know…an’ never will.’ He begins strumming the banjo all gentle
and tender like, and there’s this
tight feeling in my throat.
‘an’ never will…’ he’s a powerful voice, Johnson,
and when he gets this way, you sit and listen and nothing in the world
can pull you away.
‘Ah dreamed of home
An blessed mornings
A whisperin in the rain..’
He’s strumming steady now. Something like those downpours that used to beat upon my window.
‘A city full of living people
And a running on the plains…
‘I dreamed a skies
That spread above me
Of everlastin oceans blue
I dreamed of ships an shores an eagles
An I’m a coming home to you…’
It’s gotten very quiet.
Dad’s second mate is coughing something fierce, a
little nun is staring into her coffee, her chin trembling. Johnson
starts roaring like a maniac, laughing like there’s no tomorrow.
The man will never convince me he’s crazy. I stand up to go when
there’s a deadening thud, and the old man is lying there, sprawled across
the floor. There’s that blatant irreverence in his form, the stupid
smile on his lips. The crew is bending over him gently, trying not
to spoil their white breeches.
‘Have a care!’ someone is calling ‘the man’s dead’
‘Oh merciful lord’ the nuns are in their element now,
swaying, swinging their crosses in prayer. This to is a nightmare
and it will surely pass. I turn and break into a sprint down the
short passageway. It’s moments before I crash headlong into Dad.
He’s in a hurry, striding beside the ship doctor. But that can wait.
I grab Dad by the arms. ‘I have to go son, there’s
been an accident.’
‘I know’
‘Not now Sam, we can talk later.’ He’s trying
to break my grip.
‘No!!’ I scream. But the voice isn’t mine.
It’s an old man, trembling, holding on for strength. Dad stops struggling
and when I look he’s gazing at me
sadly and his brown eyes are flicked with gold.
I think he realizes he can no longer overpower me. I gaze up at him
a long moment. This is my last chance.
‘We don’t need to go back Dad. There’s been
a nuclear war. I know it Dad, there’s nothing there. The survivors
are crazy and diseased. They’re frightening to look at.
Dad is gazing past me. I can’t control myself
anymore.
‘We can’t go back cause no one needs us!’ I hear myself
shouting. ‘And if it’s Mom you’re looking for don’t bother cause she’s
not looking for us anymore!’
Dad is quiet for a moment and I don’t know what to
do with my hands, they are gangly and in my way. Suddenly I don’t recognize
my own father. He is the captain, his ship is an angel of rescue
and I am nothing but a coward. He tells me so, softly, as if I don’t
know it, then shoves past me and walks away. I am left alone on the
starboard.
Here past the controls is a panorama view of the universe.
I stand in the silence and trace my finger slowly along the glass.
Here, Cassiopeia, ninety
degrees to Aldebaran. My finger squeaks downward,
and in their center, Earth.
It hits me with a force so sudden that I hunch over
and shut my eyes. The sun is blinding, breaking into a thousand hues.
It is shooting sparks from the city
skyscrapers, kissing the railings of apartments, soaring
into the blue abyss. Everything is quiet, so dreamy up here.
I lean my elbows on the sill and look
down into the city. There is the park and skaters,
frozen sheets of ice on the street below. Now the sun is falling,
ever lower, ever fiercer until it will sink, aflame, into the sea.
It’s getting harder to breathe now and my chest is
hurting. There’s the café I used to stop in after school.
Now the taste of doughnuts and clatter of the
racks, a heady scent of coffee. Me and Lederer
playing basketball just dribbling it easy along the graffittee lot.
Now Dad is standing, all alone upon
the shore and the kite he holds wanders among the
winds.
I look through the glass and there stands Dad’s lone
form, holding his cap. He is waiting to go and start the funeral.
My knuckles grab the starboard railing and above me soars blackness and
the dusty stars. I put my hand
over the distant blue speck that is Earth. A
stale wind rattles from the ventilator and I close my eyes.
The earth is beautiful to me. Clear and blue
are her oceans and crystal summer waves. Lovely are her deserts and
morning fields. She was home for all of human memory. May the
lovely yellow flower bloom upon her grave.
I must go, they are starting the funeral now, paying
Johnson his last respects, and then they’ll send the body out into the
starry abyss. The crew will stand
at arms, take off their caps and Dad will speak before
the makeshift coffin and tell the dead about the beautiful journey he is
to take. I could see him now, gripping his tasseled cap. ‘Fear
not Johnson to dance among the stars, for we the living, are not afraid.