Our Lady of Providence
Oberg, Robert J
Robert J. Oberg Our Lady of Providence -for Sister Betty At eighteen my body opened out on this long downhill, something at the bottom of me saying yes for the first time as 1 climbed the curved...
...The shadow of a man startles me awake...
...Ribs hurt so bad the screams almost kill me...
...They cross me, load me on a stretcher and carry me up the long hill to the convent...
...Thick damp clay oozes from beneath my rib cage, an invisible wound that's finally surfaced...
...I stand in amazement, the silence broken by distant screams of roller coaster riders, punctuated finally by a gunshot that puts out my left eye...
...A trickle of blood washes the cavity...
...My blindness hovers like a black patch before a field of headlights that cross the Newport Bridge, its taut arch suspended above the glistening dark...
...It appears he's been here for some time...
...Robert J. Oberg Our Lady of Providence -for Sister Betty At eighteen my body opened out on this long downhill, something at the bottom of me saying yes for the first time as 1 climbed the curved embankment and sprinted past my rival to victory along the cupped hands of the bay...
...I let go again of the dead weight of myself and say yes...
...Twenty years later I stagger this hill in pain while the bright orbit of the ferris wheel mocks my progress from Rocky Point, its light eaten and offered by the bay...
...I rub the warm, smooth clay over my stomach as the automatic stars flicker slowly out...
...He spreads the paste over my eye's throb and by the time I can see again he's gone...
...I fall at the spot where I'd put Palucci behind and cry for help as I've never cried before...
...I don't know why it doesn't hurt when he dips his fingers in my wound and stirs my clay with his spittle...
...Leaves rustle behind me as two Sisters of Mercy appear and search for the print of his fingers in my wound...
...Send out all the 911 's of my mind...
Vol. 123 • October 1996 • No. 18
