The Ordainment

The chilled musky air torments the aging Saxon stone; whistling through the aisles, the sound reverberating as it sweeps along the colonnade. Moonlight penetrates ancient glass stained windows, initiating reflected shadows, as an innocent mind pulsates tempestuously, he who was called to this place begins to feel his entire body freeze, his hair upon his head erect, and prominent. Clouds steal the moonlight, the murky darkness becomes impregnated with an odour of body waste, also the sound of insidious wailing, as a dim haze envelopes the chancel and altar. Silhouettes appear in the expanding glow, transforming into states of manifestation, before the vapourized environment gives way to monochrome snapshots of sepia subjects, still frozen in a timeless layer of unenthusiastic entombment. Animated the motionless figures begin to stir, labourious breathing accompanying each macabre movement, with it a sickly vileness pervades the holy place, as in defiance of the almighty himself, defiling his very name his existence. The sonic shrill cries give way to an eerie monotonous groan, gathers momentum, as the full bodied harmonious metre drives him into hypnotic instability. Yet a lucid awareness of the bizarre pageant even more apparent, when at the ornate organ keyboard a faceless incoherent figure begins to play his favourite hymn, the wailing returns and more illuminate the spectacle becomes, as the mysterious cloaked guise silently turns, long fibrous fingers unveil a hooded cowl exposing a (recognizable face?) decaying distortion that ooze from lacklustre eyes, those that commenced to penetrate the lone onlooker. Words from motionless lips pierce his mind, there where he lay held captive with fear, grotesque decomposed forms draw closer, each in various degrees of deterioration, yet from a bygone age becoming familiar? ‘Welcome my son to the nether world’ words blending with his confusion as they echo around his brain. ‘Mother’ He cries in stark desperation rivers of perspiration flooding down his back, as the realization unfolding becomes evident, ‘Mother’ He cries once more, she moves slowly from the organ towards him, festering carrion falling to the ground, becoming death’s fodder for those around her. She stoops over him, spindly fingers gently claw at his face, he feels her cold scabrous lips across his cheek, verily seeking his own, those still warm and pulsating with life, but she does not linger there moving swift and with precision he feels her stab at his clammy neck. The wailing turns into an aria, odorous filth as fragrant wine, decaying flesh smooth and pliable, where there was fear now only love, family, friends long gone all gathered in this place, patiently waiting for new blood ‘His’ for death as life must carry on. © Harry J Horsman 2016