I envisioned the cast brass bell swinging lazily at the top of the church down the road. I could hear it from where I sat motionless under a damp apple tree with fruit warming in the sun. A dragonfly, one of the rather large, near scary-large dragonflies, dropped her altitude and kicked water droplets from a weed that stood out among the grass. Six people, two men dressed in neatly pressed suites and four women with ankle-length sun dresses in whites, light yellows, and robin's egg blues, drifted along the walk way toward the direction of the thronging. The man fronting the group spoke to three of the women as they walked. The last pair followed in silence. The male of the pair spotted me resting in the shade.
"Coming to the meeting brother?" says he placing his hands on the fence's upper member.
"I am afraid not Mister, but thank you."
"Then you shall surely miss the good news!" spoke the man.
"'The good news'?" I asked.
"Precisely, young man. For today is a day of reckoning! Atonement, if you will! Your salvation rests not in the idleness of you ill-actions but in your feeding from the 'word'!"
"The only 'word' I consider is that which utters from my own tongue, sir. Thank you nonetheless."
"Have you no regard for your salvation, brother? ...for your soul?" Asks he in full mocking smile.
"Indeed I do sir. Only, the salvation of my own soul takes place not under the authority of elders who press fabrications and parables but rather within the 'churches' established by the assurances of nature and life."
The gentleman paused and gasped. The five others had continued up the avenue and disappeared among the carriages.
"Then you shall reap certain torment. You understand this?" He asked, frowning.
"With respect, if it is torment that I shall reap from that which I sow in full earnest and sincerity then my definition or 'torment' varies from that of your own, sir."
"Quite so. Well, we believers hold a special moment within our prayers for sinners such as you, son. I can only trust that one day you will seek HE who controls the universe and lay waste your ignorance and idolatry!" The man stammered, stabbing his finger into the binding of the leather book he carried.
"In truth Mister, I have sought out and identified with THAT which controls the universe, and it is truth in knowledge... knowledge in the confirmation that this tree and this grass and these apples shall sprout forth every season with no regard for reckoning or atonement or salvation."
"G'day son."
"And the same to you indeed sir."
