The hour is upon us. He comes! He comes!
My hands tremble as I write these words. The splashes of ink across my page are like oceans on a map. Deep and blue. Soaking through and staining the oak desk beneath. My hand writes not with the familiar coils of my schooling, but in a mad scrawl that even my eyes can scarcely decipher. Mad? Yes, mad. Mad is the word for this. For what I have become. Like the egg left to boil for too long, my mind has cracked. Cracked like the windows f this house. And through these cracks I see- I see- I see-
Him! I see Him! He comes!
I feel Him as much as see. The weight on my brain like a rock. Like a rook perched on my head, digging its claws into my scalp, eager to rip open my skull and fest on the succulent knowledge within. Lobes like worms do wriggle there. Thinking and shrinking away from the light. The things we see in dark places do this to us, do they not? Strange that the shroud of black night should expose such truths of creation. Yet there are strangers things out there. And in here. In this house beside me.
The clock strikes, though its hands are long since corroded away. Or rotted. Or scratched out be unheavenly claws. It has been so long now I cannot recall where they went. What became of them. Who it was who took them from this place. I live without time now. As He does. As He always has. It is better this way. Time, for all its vaunted wonders, is but a cage which traps us. The means by which ancient Babylon cast Tiamat into Chaos and wrapped the chains of civilisation around us all. Sixes and twelves and sixties. We take them for granted, but they are no more real than a dream. An arcane lie made real by belief.
A belief I no longer hold. Such lies are not for me. No! I see only truth. The truth that is in Him, and that is of Him. He is all that matters. All that has ever mattered. All that will matter. What is, was, and will be - these things are His alone, and together are Him!
I hear a cry? Is it Him? Could it be - But no. Alas, ‘tis but some some raven tapping at the door. At the window. My eyes meet his, orbs of bright black both. I wait for him to speak, but he does not. Poe revealed no secrets of speech there. The raven can but squawk. Shrill and animal and stupid. Then, with a flap of his night-dark wings, he is gone. Away into the waiting night. The darkness of clouds encroaching on the moonless sea of stars. A thousand cold eyes watching from on high. With envy or pity or disinterest I cannot say. I know only that they see what they should not. As ever they have.
It is by candle alone that I see. The last concession to my mortal frailties. A refuge from my own inability in His domain. The oils have dried in the lamps. The wood beside the fire is mossy and wet, not fit for burning. The candle calls to me with its flicking orange hand, beckoning me closer. The scent of burning tallow inflames my nose, a wisp of smoke rising lazily for the cracked-open window. Smoke alone can escape this house. The wax is but a melted stump, stuck fast to the desk at which I sit, pale fingers trickling over the rim and dripping splashes to the floor. It is soft to the touch, still warm. Malleable. The candle flickers once more. There is less life in this flame than even in the rest of this empty house.
Where is He? He promised He would come!
The ink is all but gone now, and I have had to seek a fresh supply. Those oceans of blue are now tainted by reefs of crimson coral. New blotches stain my work like a child’s roses. Ugly and stubborn, denying my efforts to rub them out. A shadow passes over the room, and it takes me a moment to realise it is the drooping of my own eyes. I have been here so long now. The candle is all but dead. Soon I may follow. But I know it will be worth it. To gaze upon Him one time. A life of prayer and struggle. All to bear witness to His arrival. This is all the rewards I ask for.
I sit in darkness now. The last light of the candle is gone. I can feel the wet ink beneath my fingertips, but I can no longer see the words I write. Cannot tell if my hands obey my mind. Perhaps what I write is not what I think. Perhaps these words take on a life of their own, unwitnessed by mortal eyes.
Where is He? Lord, why do you forsake me? I feel myself slipping. Fading into darkness. The blankness of the beyond. Is this His will? Must I be one final sacrifice in His name? If that is my lot then so be it. There is nothing else left for me. The world I leave left me so very long ago. Even if I were to return, it would not accept me. Could not. The paths are lost, my route forgotten. I could wander a lifetime more and never get back to what I left behind. There is only onward. There is only downward. Into the waiting deeps. Beyond the flesh, beyond the mind, beyond the soul, beyond even time and creation itself. He will take me to His bosom and hold me one first and last time before we all fade away.
Please. There is nothing left to write with. Nothing left to write. Nothing left to say but a wordless, pities begging howl. I waited for Him, and He did not come. Was I wrong? Was it all for nothing? No. No! I cannot believe his. Cannot accept that this is all for nought. There was a mistake. Somewhere. There must have been.
The clock! The clock is wrong. He will be here soon enough. I need only hold on to myself a little while longer. Though my hands are cold and my eyes blind. Though my legs are dead beneath me and the rest of my body eager to follow. I will wait. I will aways wait for Him.
He will come! He will come. He will
