Spectacular
In Sunday School I asked Miss Hooker why
I was ever born, I'm not old enough
to ask how - don't ask me why I don't know
why not - and she told me to wait until
class was over and she'd fill me in, like
I'm one of those circles that are more like
zeros on the fancy answer-sheets for
our test-papers in regular school, fill
'em in with a No. 2 pencil, no
lighter nor I reckon darker and what
-ever else you might use don't use an ink
pen but what happened was I'd asked her at
the wrong damn time, Miss Hooker that is, we'd
just finished with the Lord's Prayer, we say
it at the beginning of class and half
-way through it and at the end, I call it
a trinity of Lord's Prayers and I
just made that up and that's no lie as God
is my witness and Jesus and for good
measure the Holy Ghost so I guess what
I did was I spoiled the moment, spoke out
or is it up too soon after Amen,
which we all say together, shout it's more
like it, I like religion when it's fun
and sometimes it is, but in church I fall
asleep, not so easy to do since our
pastor hollers and dances and stomps while
he's preaching the Word, a whole slew of words
is what it is, and I hardly ever
get a chance to ask difficult questions
in there or of Miss Hooker in Sunday
School class and usually by the time
it's over I'm anxious to get the Hell
out of there and go home, there's nothing like
running away to stay interested
but anyway after class and after
our final shouted-as-one Amen I
went up to Miss Hooker behind her desk
and asked if she had time to handle my
question and she took off her spectacles, I
wouldn't call them glasses, they're spectacles,
and looked up at me since I was taller
with her sitting down and just me standing
and smiled about as widely as you can
smile or is it broadly and as for ear
to ear, nobody smiles like that except
in comics and cartoons and my sister's
puppet collection, the clowns I mean, and
said Let's take it to the Lord in prayer,
Gale, I'm lucky that she didn't see me
roll my eyes, so we dropped to our knees and
Miss Hooker did all the talking though I
grunted a few times in the right places
and then when she finished I helped her out
with Amen and then up on her feet and
then she asked me how I felt and if God
had given me His answer yet so I
said Nah, but maybe He's busy right now
and Miss Hooker laughed and pinched my right cheek
with her right hand, only not hard enough
and I don't know why I said that, maybe
I should've asked her to do it again.
Good and Mad
I'm in love with my Sunday School teacher,
Miss Hooker, but there's not much hope for us
because I'm 10 to her 25 and
by the time I'm her age she'll be past it
by plenty, fifteen years if I'm counting
right. What I need is a miracle from
God, that He'll put us on a par, the same
age and the sooner the better. Just how
He'll do it is up to Him, I guess, but
He'll have options and I can remind Him
in prayer every night - for example,
He can hold Miss Hooker to her age now
until I catch up or at least until
I'm 16, which seems mature to me, what
with shaving and a driver's license and
my voice like Father's and a part-time job
even though I'll just be a sophomore.
Or He can make Miss Hooker age backwards
to ten years old. I hope He'd do it fast
but even then we'll be too young to do
everything married people can do, like
stay up too late and have babies and pay
taxes, or not, or at least fudge them some.
But if God makes me older faster and
Miss Hooker younger and quick about it
then we might meet halfway, say 18,
if He takes my advice, not that I'd give
Him advice, exactly, but just point out
His options, like I say, then how could she
turn down my proposal when I put it
to her? Unless there's a lesson to be
learned and I have to learn it the hard way
and it's for my own good and I'll fear Him
even more than I do now, or think I
do. Maybe when we're both 18 I'll pray
to be older the next day when I go
back to ply my troth again, but maybe
God won't answer that prayer, or answers
no. And there I'll be, eight years older and
all of it gone overnight, for nothing.
Maybe then I'll just get mad, good and mad,
and tell Him straight, tell Him that he tricked me,
tell Him if it was He who came to me
and asked me what I asked of Him then I
would've been square, would've played the game out
but good. And I'd see the look on His face
and turn on my heel and ignore His pleas
to forgive Him, it serves Him right, let that
be a lesson to Thee, I'd say, I'll find
me another God Almighty--Jesus
wept, I'll remind Him, and now You know why.
Or maybe He'd get on His hands and knees
and I'd have mercy on Him. Maybe not.
Odds are I'll get no miracle at all,
of course - they don't happen to real people
save the ones in the Bible and those French
kids at Lourdes and maybe some Mexican
Catholics and some Christian Scientists
and Chuck Heston in The Ten Commandments
and Dorothy Gale in The Wizard of Oz
and Willie Mays in a game I saw once
on TV, and folks who win lotteries
(the chances of winning are so slim that
surely winning is a miracle) and
Captain Kirk getting out of those tight spots
and that swimmer winning seven medals,
all gold, and Ringo replacing Pete Best
in the Beatles. I could go on and it
would take time and by the time I finished
I still wouldn't have one my very own,
a miracle I mean. Maybe that means
I should be giving them, not receiving,
but that would make me God, I guess, a job
I'd probably hate, if I'm any judge.
Dutch
Our God is a good God, says Miss Hooker.
She should know - she's our Sunday School teacher
and is probably closer to Him than
anyone else I know, except for dead
people and babies who've just been baptized.
And maybe nuns but we're not Catholics
so I don't really have an opinion.
Anyway, a God who made Miss Hooker
is all right with me. She's beautiful and
every night before I go to sleep I
pray for a miracle - if you're going
to pray you might as well pray big, I think,
go all out, the whole hog, go bananas -
that one day we'll get married even though
she's more than twice as old as I am, say
25 to my 10. There's not much hope
but I guess that's what prayer's for, a shot
at getting what's impossible. If God
will slow her age down and speed up mine some
then we can meet halfway one day. And if
that happens then it's almost a sure thing
that when I drop to one knee and propose -
that shouldn't be hard, I'm small for my age -
she'll accept me, which means that she'll say Sure
and then we're off to be married and then
on to our honeymoon where God shows us
how to make a baby, or a dozen
but not all at once. And maybe she's wise
already to just how and will show me
because, after all, she is a teacher.
Red hair and green eyes and skin as smooth as
the legs of a grand piano, I'll bet,
not that I play, and a mouth full of keys
and all ivory-white. An angel. And
sometimes she wears a yellow dress and
the next week blue and the week after that
pink or green or some color I don't know
but a thing doesn't have to have a name
to be pretty. She's easy on the eyes
inside, too, I think - she's got the skinny
on the Bible and can tell the story
of David and Goliath just like it
happened yesterday or she saw them fight
on her way to church this morning, so if
we're on the sofa and tired of watching
cartoons and wrestling and infomercials
on TV, she can tell a good story
from the Bible and those old times when folks
didn't drive or use a Dutch oven or
talk on the telephone or go to school
forever or almost get run over
crossing the street to check the mail, like me.
So when Miss Hooker says that God is good
she's damned right. I haven't seen everything
in life, of course, but when I look at her
I've seen it all, and I just made that up.
After every class I almost tell her
that but I'm too shy and always back down.
Mother says, Faint heart ne'er won fair lady,
which she stole from the Bible, or Shakespeare,
or maybe Liberace. Anyway
when I asked her for advice about gals
she probably thought I meant those at school.
Maybe the miracle I want is guts
to tell Miss Hooker what's in my heart. Yes,
I think I'll try that tonight, right after
I say the Lord's Prayer in the dark while
I stare at my attic ceiling, where God
must be, too, because He's everywhere
and didn't Miss Hooker say so last week?
Last night I dreamt I held her in my arms
but I had four of them, the better to
hold her as close as I could. It was good
that it was dark so that she couldn't see
so that she wouldn't be afraid she was
in Hell. In Sunday School this morning I
tried to catch her eye to see if she'd had
the same dream last night. She just smiled at me.
Old Glory
Down at church I'm supposed to worship God
and in Sunday School the focus is on
Jesus but when I'm home, especially
at night, all I think of is Miss Hooker,
my teacher - red hair, green eyes, and freckles.
And sometimes painted fingernails--Mother
doesn't approve but she'll never stop us
getting together when I'm old enough.
I'm just 10. Miss Hooker's plenty old at
25, almost too old, in fact, but
not nearly as old as Mother, Father
too, for that matter. They're over 30
and that's getting up there. All three must die
long before I do, if everything
works out well and I'm not killed in some way
other than old age. I'll wait a few years
and ask Miss Hooker out. If her hair's gray
by then I'll just think of peppermint or
two of the three colors of Old Glory.
Last week her fingernails were blue. That's three.
Last night I dreamt we had a baby, or
she did. I'm not sure how we pulled it off
but I've heard stories, though not from Mother
or Father. He says he doesn't know. He's
kidding, I hope. I asked Mother but
she said it's been so long she's forgotten.
I told Father that and he just laughed. But
then he frowned and told me to go outside.
He didn't add to play. He just wanted
to be shunt of me. So that's how it is.
But when I'm old enough I'll have a child,
or Miss Hooker will, and somehow I'll help.
That's all the truth I know. Is it enough?
And then I guess he'll come to me, or she,
to ask how they were born. What will I say?
The truth must be a little terrible,
as bad as death, or damn near, or even
worse. So I don't know where I came from and
I don't know where I'm going. Wonderful.
In Sunday School Miss Hooker says I'll go
to Heaven if I'm good and Hell if I'm
bad. I'm some of both but I think God takes
the average. He totals up the times
for each, divides, and compares. That seems fair.
And she says that all souls come from Heaven
does Miss Hooker. If I was ever there
I don't remember. It's like the time I
was playing monkey in the privet tree
and the rope snapped and the next thing I knew
I was lying on the ground out of breath,
I mean I was out of breath, not the ground -
I didn't hit it hard enough for that
but I did hit it hard enough for me.
Someone helped me up. It was Father. He
asked me if I knew who he was and how
many fingers he was holding up and
my name. For some time not time I didn't.
I bet I'll never be that smart again.
When it all came back I was ignorant
as usual. Do thumbs count as fingers?
Small
After Sunday School today I threw up
behind our portable classroom so no
one could see or hear me but Miss Hooker
did and came to the little round window
and pushed it out, I didn't know it would
open but sure enough she stuck her head
out and kind of downward and called Gale, Gale,
what's the matter, Honey, have some bad break
-fast? so I looked up to answer but she
was gone and about two minutes later
she came around the end of the building,
of course there are two, two ends I mean, I
mean the east end but the way my head was
spinning, spinning, it might as well have been
the west but doesn't it say in the Good
Book somewhere about the end and the be
-ginning and the Alpha and Omega
so maybe it doesn't really matter -
Miss Hooker arrived as I was spitting
up the last of my breakfast, which was zilch
since I woke up late and was afraid to
miss Sunday School, God might get me for that,
Jesus and the Holy Ghost, too, and then
there's Miss Hooker, who chewed me out last week
for being ten minutes tardy and made
me stay late to stack hymnbooks and dump trash.
Then she laid hands on me, well, the right hand
but then again it might've been her left
on the small of my back, that's right above
my butt and below my actual back
and I shouldn't say butt, that's a dirty
word and you go to Hell for smuttiness
Miss Hooker says but anyway it felt
fair and so I did it to her, too, I
did it in return that is, that is when
I was standing tall again even though
I'm not, I'm only ten years old and small
for my age and she gave me a look that
meant if I hadn't been upchucking then
she'd have slapped me if I'd been old enough
and then, right then, I wished I was and still
do, then maybe she'd know that I love her
and want to marry her one day and her
slap would've stunned her as well and she'd be
my gal from that moment on so much so
that her attention would last until I'm
old enough to marry her and to Hell
with a first date, sometimes first love is last
and this is one of those times. I wanted
to kiss her but she's too tall, even on
my tiptoes, not Miss Hooker on mine, ha ha,
that would be a Hell of a miracle.
Then I followed her into our classroom
and we sat together on two stools in
front of her desk below God-become-man
on the Cross behind her desk. Then she said
I'll give you a ride home but I said, No
thank you, ma'am, I'll walk there same as always.
Then she said, Well, I'll walk with you and that's
how I fell out of love with her. I said
I'm sorry, ma'am, but where I'm going you
cannot come. It's damn-near like religion.
21
After Sunday School this morning I asked
Miss Hooker, she's my teacher, I asked her
what if God and Jesus and the Holy
Ghost were the first three batters in the line
-up who the clean-up hitter would be but
that one stymied her, it's got me beat, too,
you got a man, though it's more than a man
though most baseball players are if you ask
me, I'm just 10, I should know about man
-hood - you've got a decent lead-off guy and
a second batter who can move him o
-ver and batting third someone with power
but behind him who's the man? Miss Hooker
said that she didn't begin to know and
I said, Well, that's okay, I'll figure it
out and then I asked her her favorite
player and she said The late Roberto
Clemente and not just because he could
go out of the zone to smack anything
but his humanitarianism
and he died trying to help others and
not only others but others a lot
less fortunate than he was so I said
Yes ma'am - I didn't know what to say since
when I grow up I want to play baseball
for a living, I mean in the majors
and make a million bucks a year and not
even Hank Aaron's making that and I
told Miss Hooker so, about my dream is
what I mean and she replied, Well, if you
make enough money for what you need and
a little left over to deposit
in the bank then I'd say you're plenty rich
as it is so I said Yes ma'am again,
what can you say to good sense like that when
it's wrong and the truth is really the truth
like the Bible says inside somewhere, is
it Jesus, someone asks Him Who can be
saved right after He's just said another
impossible thing, shades of Miss Hooker,
and He answered something like With God all
thing are possible but not with just-folks
or something like that, if it hasn't got
pictures and stories about Superman
and Batman and the Teen Titans I don't
read it but I've got a fair memory
for what folks tell me so before I said
Goodbye to Miss Hooker and See you next
Sunday I looked her in the eyes, I looked
so hard that I stuck myself in there and
was twins, identical to boot, on left
and right or right and left, anyway you
count me, then I forgot what I wanted
to say so instead I said Roberto
Clemente is staring back at me, which
was a fib but it got Miss Hooker good
and this afternoon I'm going to watch
The Game of the Week with Curt Gowdy and
Tony Kubek and Father and my dog,
not all of us inside the tube of course
and I don't know which teams are playing but
I don't care, I just want it to be good
and sometimes the clean-up batter leads off,
especially during a perfect game,
which I've never seen. Or maybe I have.
Gale Acuff has had hundreds of poems published in several countries and is the author of three books of poetry. He has taught university English in the US, China, and Palestine.
