A True Confession III

(The Holy Communion)

Near the Eucharist, at where the body of Christ was hid, and His blood was in a bottle kept, it happened. We had a puerile romance. Not that we were ignorant of the place, not that we were nescient of its sanctum sanctorum, but, we were as weak as humans. We couldn't hold it any longer as a man and a woman, we were caddish. We had a small but gentle sex at the sacred place.

In the early phase of my ontogenesis, when life gave me little to think about, I joined a catechism class in inexorable prolusion to receive the communion. I was a little younger than 16 years, cute in body and had a round face that matched my small head. I was everything handsome. (I can't trust my mirror these days). We learned the lessons by heart. I could recite the rosary, the Angelus, the Apostle's creed and many other catholic prayers.

The class was in session any other day apart from Sundays, from 4pm to 6pm and anybody who came 5mins past the reporting time, had the catechist to face. Punctuality was just our hallmark. I was the defending paladin in the class and I faced strict opposition in memorizing the prayers by Janet. Janet was the most rigorous oppugner I had ever faced in my life. She was smallish but a year older than I was. She wore long hair that most of time ran down her butt. Even at such a tender age, she had already developed some coquettish curves and a pair of succulent breast. And she had a cherubic voice. Whenever Janet recited the prayers to Saint Michael, you could instantaneously feel the presence of a supreme being, she had an unnamed magic in her voice which enamoured all of us. She was Mr Ephraim, the catechist's, favourite student and I was the people's choice.

One Friday afternoon, the sun was up high behind the mango trees and scintillated its rays through the leaves; it projected a cinema of shadows on the walls of the lonely cathedral and its statue of Arch Angel Michael. In the hands of Michael was a spear thrusting deep into the naked left breast of a defeated serpent. That sculpture always reminded me of Janet and her sweet voice. Rumours had it that, each time Janet recited the prayers to Angel Michael she invoked the spirit in the statue. And it was also a popular belief that she always came to catechism earlier than anybody else to perform some rituals with the statue. Regina always argued vehemently that, she had caught Janet red handed talking to the statue twice when she (Regina) sleuthed her (Janet) actions inadvertently. She would even spice it up with a more shuddering story; 'Janet eeh that girl is a witch oo! She even took the spear from Obofopom Michael and set the serpent free'. Regina always got our emotions hagriddened each time she got to this part of the story.

So, on that faithful Friday, I reported earlier, if my memory could serve me right, I should be confident in saying that I went as early as 2:45pm in my school uniform. I went straight to the cathedral after school had closed. I was the only one in the premises. I went to the statue and greeted the Arch Angel, hoping to hear the mysterious reply but I never did, He was silent and fixed his gaze on the serpent. After many ineffectual attempts to get the statue to talk, I shamefully retreated. I entered the church. Therein was a dead silence which scared me as a cemetery would. The lights were off but the sun shed its rays with meridian splendour through the designed holes in the walls, and left on the pews and on the terrazzo floor of the church large innocent shadows. The shadows were those of trees, of Father Nsiah's car and of the mission house. I was enjoying the solemnity of the atmosphere in the church. The pews were good friends of men. I moved three steps forward and I saw a Bible left in the shelf of the last but one pew and I picked it, browsed through the pages without necessarily reading anything. I completed the whole book without a word mentioned. Just at the spot, I scrooched and saw some coins scattered freely just below the first pew. I rushed there and gathered them, counted and it amounted to 400 cedis. At least that was enough for a toffee after the day's session, I thought. I rested my butt on the flat and smooth veneer surface of the first pew. I was still for a while. Abruptly, I started thinking so much about the communion. I thought about whether it was true that the communion was the body of Christ and the wine the blood. If they were pieces of bread and wine, and by just a few incantations by Father Nsiah they turned to be something so sacred? These were the usual questions playing my mind up and down.

My thoughts were disturbed by a sudden cry of a car engine. It was the usual blue car that always picked up Janet from the Chapel to the house. I quickly hid myself under the far end of the sixteenth pew, close to a hole in the neighbouring wall to where the statue stood. Where I could have a graphic view of the happenings outside. Call the act espial and you wouldn’t be any far from the truth. Janet jumped off the vehicle, and waved her right hand at the driver, who responded in same fashion.  She then went straight to the statue. I was so anxious. I knew the moment I had been waiting for had arrived.

'Good afternoon dear Arch Angel Michael', she didn't wait for His response before continuing her rather monologues;

'Dear Michael.....'

'Heerh Janet....I have caught you paaa, today di3 I will tell when the rest come', I interrupted. Silly boy, what would waiting a little longer do to me, I said to myself. It appeared I was too anxious to be noticed than a spy would.

'What did I do?'

'Were you not talking to the statue?'

'Yes, I was but what is wrong with that?

'Everything, you were going to free the serpent if I had not cut in'

'Hahahaha, what are you doing in there?' She asked while entering the church. She made a court bow at foot of the altar, something I did not do. Janet knew so much and I was envious of her. I watched her as she moved with the wind on the floor of the church, touching the pews unconsciously and dragging her feet along. Her hips were curved and her face was glittering by the assistance of the sun that owned most of the items in there.

I had long had a thing for Janet though we were young, I knew something about love.

'Janet, Eerrmhhmm did you know that the communion and red wine were hid in the Eucharist? '

'Oh yes and I have always wanted to have a feel of them' She responded quickly while taking romantic steps towards the altar and I followed her closely behind. Observing the up and down movement of her round and heavy butt.

We climbed the altar which stood up the east of the church room, went to the Eucharist and made a court bow. We paused for a minute for a coup d'oeil at the fear on our faces. We were timid to act any further from where we stood. We had from infancy venerated the place. Nobody went there, save the priest, nor him but once when he was cleansed spiritually and fit and proper person to administer the communion.

'Janet, I’m not sure I want to do this'

'Well, I will do it, but promise me you won't tell anybody'

'Okay, buy my lips with a kiss'

She looked at me as if she had seen a stranger in me. Well, my request came to her unsuspecting. Nevertheless, she gave in to my price for a silence. She brought her head closer to mine; I gathered my lips forward with the upper lip taking the lead and closed my eyes softly while anticipating my first lips to lips kiss. For a moment Janet had paused to swallow a heavy breath. I opened my eyes to observe whether all is well then again I closed my eyes. She finally gripped my lips with hers. She kissed me first on my lips, and then on my cheeks, she moved slowly but romantically towards my chest. I grabbed her with my little macho; we were fastened tightly together as if we had employed the service of a screw driver. We kissed to the rhythms of Celine Dion's ‘From a distance’ which played from a faraway distance and was carried by the air into the chapel from the mission house. We were not the only persons who had found love that lonely afternoon but also were Father Nsiah and the rest of the maid that lived in the mission house.

Everything in the building resonated with our kissing and romancing. The air, the large shadows, the pews and the Eucharist - they were all looking on helplessly and cheered us while we made love. I was hard downstairs in my shorts. It projected and Janet felt it against her hot thighs. She stopped the kissing to laugh briefly; I joined her in my shyness. She held my cock like a pen and she seemed to be writing on her tights with the head of it. It really entered me, the feelings.

'JANET....... sto....op
those things do it, it again haaaaaahhh Janet not anymore
More Janet ...okay stop right there... I can't take it a...gain'

I moaned while she performed magic with my cock on her body and finally when she tried to force it in her dry vagina. After many unsuccessful attempts to push my dick straight into her, she finally gave up a big sigh and rested her disappointed self-right beneath the Eucharist. The Eucharist was a wooden box which was appended to the wall at the right corner of the altar. It was neatly decorated and covered by a white veil and on top of it was a metallic artefact of Jesus Christ. Janet picked herself from the ground. She had recollected her mission and had paid her price enough to zip my lips forever. She boldly opened the Eucharist, and to our surprise a red light shone in it, so bright that it nearly blinded us. We couldn't stand the light. Janet forcefully shut it and we ran quickly towards the exit. We stopped just at the door and made sure we were cleared of all doubts before stepping outside.

For some peculiar reasons, perhaps, our censurable conscience, we both discontinued the catechism and so couldn't take the communion that year. However, we both took it finally in our respective senior secondary schools and coincidentally we are both no longer Catholics. I guess we can never be with this guilt in our inner selves. But they say God forgives he who confesses truly his sins. And here I am, God forgive me.

NB: Don't be too quick to judge me or Janet please.

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Freestyle Spoken Word

Has day expired already?
And the sun retired to its peaceful rest in the west?
Has the wind not lied to the atmosphere yet?
And birds on branches tweeting and gossiping
About nature's architecture best
Where you miss nothing more than the warmth of love
Love unseen
what causes you to skip a breath is love unheard
Knowing not who and how to love
Especially when you have tasted the cake before
You are left with nothing else
But with memories of long ago deeds
Moments captured in frames
Of silent hours alone in the woods
And you watch them like they too never die
You harvest more from life
And far more from the songs
Composed by a choir of birds, silence and the dead times
Times never to resurrect
And you find your head nodding to the rhythms with the trees that don't know a thing about love
The only thing they remember is lovers kissing right beneath their shades
They don't know how to say 'I love you'
Damn! dumb trees
All they are best at is dancing
Dancing
Crazy dancers, they don't have feelings like you
Lest they stop dancing and study technology too
And learn why you are here chatting with me
And not paying any mind to either the birds or the moment.
Every thing don't make sense to you at the moment
Not even my words do
I have heard
So when you are done reading this poem
You may chuckle or laugh it off
Which ever way, I will feel loved here in Ghana because I influenced your emotions.

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The Freemason and The Boy

‘The Freemason and the Boy’ is a chronology of the happenings between Mr. Otchere (The Freemason) and Nyantakyi (The Boy), which unfolds the true identity of the Freemasons in an already brainwashed community. Many furphies surround the Freemasons in an African society and the writer was much aware of the rumours, and in his quest to know the truth for himself, he finally took bold step to join the Freemasons. So now, he writes as a Mason and as one who grew with the many scuttlebutts about the oldest and largest fraternity in the world - Freemasonry.

In the stories, he carefully and artistically stretches out the doubts of the people in the community, the Freemason’s stand, how the people see the Freemason and how the Freemason limns a true self of knowledge and divinity, the boy’s belief about him and what finally led the boy to join. But let me leave it here for your own serious perusal, whether or not the boy actually regretted after joining, or whether he saw it worth all the struggles. Or whether all the rumours were actually true about the Freemasons, and that Mr. Otchere had lied to him all the while.

Suspense forms a greater part of this book. Every page is a mind-blower and you would want to read ahead, only to end up wanting to read further, even the end leaves you unsated until you go over the whole book again and read it, this time, with much patience. We are all curious to know what the Freemasons do behind closed doors, why they wear black lounge suits in their meetings,what binds as a brotherhood, in fact everything about them. And right here the writer seems to have said it all or paint it for the one who reads and reads it well. So many was hidden in this book, it takes one to get into the book to know it for himself. The philosophies of the Freemasons, their livelihood and their principles, all that is right there in the pages ahead, but till you put your eccentricity aside and pay close attention to the details, am sorry you will be thrown into complete disarray.

Another thing that intrigued me was the way Clifford chose his characters and developed them. You would come across a whole lot of persons in the book. Some just walked by, others just gossiped, but he never lost grip on the two principal characters, Nyantakyi and Mr. Otchere. They are so alive in every page of the book. Clifford created vivid pictures of them in the very first chapter and they became more and more graphic as the stories unfolded. Another character was the boy’s mother. Right from the beginning, we are told that she is dead, and then along the line, she seemed to have awaken and doing more, then you get confused as to whether she was actually dead, finally, you come to find out in the end that she was only a ……………… (That too is something I will leave you to dig it out).

Let us not talk about his settings yet, oh my God, they remind me of Ernest Hemingway’s ‘The Old man and The Sea’ , so much attention to details, well description of places. At a point you would feel yourself living with the characters in the community, as if you can actually touch a building or you may feel stupid (Sorry but that is how I felt).

I am privileged to read it first before anyone else. And I endorse it with a Big Yes. I will encourage everybody to rush in for their copies when it is been published.

Rachel Rada.
Waterford, Ireland.

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