by
Robert T. Tuohey
The Lord Returneth
Getting back from His coffee break, the Lord Our God looked about His universe and saw that it was still good. Turning His attention then to the Third Stone from the Sun (as Saint Jimi hath sung), the Big Guy did frown-eth.
Casting His brooding gaze down upon the face of the Earth, the Lord did thereupon see all manner of horror, cruelty, and a whole lot of plain dumb-ass stupidity.
Man was seen to mistreat man (and was pretty awful to woman and child, as well). Humanity was seen to misuse the Earth (even Space was being cluttered up with flying, tinfoil garbage). But worst of all, no plea of prayer, nay, not even a whisper, could be discerned thru the deafening chant of Cash! Cash! Cash!
In short, things were FUBAR.
The Wrath of God
Thus, the Lord did cause both Time and Tide to stop dead-still. The Earth did cease to spin and the oceans did cease to roll. Coins did not jingle and booties did not jiggle.
And from the firmament the voice of God did thunder.
“What the Hell is going on down there?” spake the Lord.
But the people had long forgotten the sacred voice, and into fearful silence were shocked.
“Well, speak up, damn it!” boomed the sky. “What's the big idea?”
Hereupon the people did cry out. The children dropped their sticks and stones and cried for their mothers. The mothers dropped their grudges and called for their men. And the men dropped their cash and reached for their shotguns.
In dismay the Lord Our God did watch.
Suddenly, the Four Winds rose in blood curdling howl and the very Pillars of Heaven and Earth did quake.
“Who is responsible for this mess?” roared the wrathful Creator.
And now the people, as one, became as stool-pigeons to the Lord (as the Prophet Lightning Hopkins hath sung).
Brother did incriminate brother. Sister did accuse sister. Wife and husband did slander one another. And everyone blamed the government.
Thus, the Lord's omnipotent, infinite ears were filled to their very brims. And yet on the cacophony clanged…and clanged…
When God's own patience was at its end, he held out His mighty hand and bid silence.
“Shut the hell up already!”
Thus the people were bitch-slapped into silence.
Here Come Da Judge
“It is the children of Cain who have caused this evil epoch!” spake the Lord. “All crime and aberration have issued there-from. They have murdered. They have stolen. They have created words like bootylicious. Verily, I say unto to you, it is these malcontents who have befouled my good works!”
The people saw that God was real big and real bad, and friggin' mad. And so the people all agreed that God was good, and God was right. And so they did bow their heads in the dust.
With a single, disdainful flick of His all-mighty wrist, God did then blast every criminal from the face of the Earth. Those who had been convicted, were gone. Those who had evaded Justice (even with the help of Johnny Cochrane), were gone. Those in the very act of evil, yet unconsummated, were gone. And all in a blinding flash!
“TCB,” commented the angel Elvis unto the Lord.
And God saw that it was good.
And so He made the evening fall on the first day of His return.
Shit Happens
On the morrow, however, God saw that things were once again in the toilet.
The great masses of people, though now relieved of the banal brutality of the common criminal, still were seen to groan and suffer. And the foul degradation of the Earth and her animals continued unabated.
The voice of God did thunder forth.
“Crap! I thought I fixed this! Who's jerking my chain now?”
The people, with dread fear in their immortal souls, fell silent.
But the searching gaze of God doth see all ~ ‘tis a fiercely bright radiance, from which none can hide (something like a big spotlight that scans a prison yard). In not time flat, the Creator had bagged the dirty culprits.
“Cruel captains of commerce, usurpers of power,” spake the Lord, “you have abused my children, not paying diddly-squat for the sweat of their brow, and treated my Earth like a two-bit Babylonia slut!”
The people then did cry unto the Lord. The workers blamed the managers, and the managers blamed the bosses, and the bosses pleaded the Fifth.
The Lord was already feeling wrathful, but this legalese mumbo-jumbo sent Him into a hissy-fit.
In a single, sweeping breath, all those who had owned and exploited were returned unto the dust from which they had come.
“Have I not said: It is easier for a camel to enter Heaven than a rich man to pass thru the eye of a needle?” misquoted the Lord.
The ever-bookish angel Aristotle corrected God.
“Whatever!” spake the Lord.
And so the Earth was once again cleansed of evil, and (though still a bit miffed) He saw that it was good.
Here ended the second day of the Lord's return.
The Dawn and Fall of the False
It was with great hope that the Lord caused the Sun to rise on the third day of His return ~ and yet the people were, once again, discombobulated.
“Holy Hell!” cursed The All-Knowing. “What's wrong now?”
Overnight, all manner of priests, gurus, and soothsayers had sprung up, like so many weeds about a fertile cesspool, each claiming a direct-line to the Big Man upstairs.
And yet, the Lord knew them not.
Yea, it was these false prophets that had the people praying – and paying.
The people crawled and bawled, recited silly-ass chants to non-existent deities, and danced and pranced like a bunch of goddamned fools.
While most of the priests knew it was no more than a good con, some were so deluded as to believe their own bull…
Each sect knew itself, and itself alone, to be RIGHT. And so, with the gleeful, solemn cruelty of the righteous, every sect set upon every other, tooth and nail. No matter fists and clubs, knives and guns, nay, atomic bombs, everything was put to use in the Name Of God.
“Friggin' jackasses!” roared the Lord.
With an annoyed toss of his sandaled foot, He then booted the entire posse of falsies into the fire of the Ever-Burning Lake.
“That'll teach those jokers,” spake the Lord.
And though the Earth still stank with spattered blood and strewn bodies, God saw that it was again good.
“Now clean up that mess you made!” commanded the Father of Men.
Here ended the third day of the Lord's return.
The Spin-Doctor's Doom
It was Thursday, the fourth day of the Lord's Comeback Special. The carnage had been cleared away, and everything should have been as right as rain on a fair April morn ~ but the people's minds were encased in a dense fog.
Television, the internet, radio, and newspapers and rags of every description were all a-scream with double-dutch socio-politico-economic “analysis” of THE LORD. Each group had its own “insights” and “issues”. And, as usual, each group knew it was right and everybody else was wrong.
Debate was as heated as a Chicago whorehouse at convention-time. Pundits rose and fell like so many worn-out cocks on generic Viagra. The babble was bloody deafening and the ink-slingers were knee-deep in their own shit.
“Whose baby's that?”
“What's your angle?”
“Whose angel?”
“Are you my angel?”
“I'll buy that!”
When the Lord came on the scene…Hell, even He was stumped. He stood back, scratching His infinite noggin, trying to make sense of it…
Then the Thunderbolt of Clarity smote His mind.
“This is all bull-squat!” He boomed.
And as quick as you wipe your ass, every politician and mass media monkey was flushed down into the Bowels of Perdition.
And the Lord saw that it was good, etcetera, etcetera.
The Simple and the Wise
The next morning the Lord decided that things needed to be set straight, and so He called a meeting of the people. Unfortunately, nobody showed up.
The women were caring for the little ones, the men were rustling up meals for everybody, and the kids were rediscovering kick-ball, jacks, and fishing. Nihilist intellectuals everywhere had given up everything except playing chess…
The Lord was mightily annoyed at this disregard of his Divine Authority, but Omnipotent Power has its advantages: He simple forced all to drop whatever they were doing (no matter child, corn, or chess-piece) and sit up and pay some mind.
He began by explaining He was All-Wise and All-Knowing…How He had created a perfect universe…His plan for humanity…
Soon, however, the great majority of this captive audience was sound asleep. Of the wakeful few, they seemed to be contemplating something else…
And yet on the Lord spoke: He eloquently discoursed on His own greatness…He recounted history, emphasizing the crime and the sublime…
It was not until the sun had begun to set upon the sixth day of the Lord's return that He finally saw fit to shut up.
A golden peace, punctuated by the gentle sounds of deep sleep, had fallen upon the Earth. Thus the Lord knew that now only the very simple and the very wise were left upon His Earth, all others having been swept away…
The very simple cannot understand God, and do not try, but merely attend to their work. The very wise know that no one can understand Life, and so simply attend to their work.
And God saw that this was truly good.
“Let them awake on the New Day and find a New Life,” spake the Lord.
Back at the Ponderosa
The Lord and his best bud, Lucifer, were sipping cappuccinos and having a friendly game of chess.
On Earth, the people worked and played and were like unto the lilies of the field.
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