The Miry Clay

I had known from some time in that

afternoon that I was dying I knew

absolutely but I didn’t want to die

because I was an atheist and I was uh I

knew that I was terrified of it because

dying means the end of everything a 38

year old college professor my work was

shown in some museums you know had won

some prizes you know and a wife and two

kids and you know a career and you know

one of the thoughts that go through how

could this happen

I went unconscious I awoke from that and

I felt wonderful I’m like I’d ever felt

in my entire life wait so you knew you

died and suddenly you felt great well I

didn’t know I’d died I just I’d been

unconscious and now I feel great you

know and where were you standing next to

the bed upright and I the first thing I

was like why do I feel so good I just

felt the worst that ever felt in my

entire life

yeah I mean I couldn’t breathe and now

I’m like Superman and my eyesight my

hearing my taste and then say you still

don’t know you’re dead no and you feel I

would figure to live if you feel I feel

more alive than I’ve ever felt in my

entire life and and your senses you said

are heightened yeah I mean this world

ever since this experience has been kind

of a disappointing because this world is

sort of dreamlike compared to the

reality that are experienced in this

mm-hmm and

I heard people calling me in English

kind of nicely you know Howard Howard

come here come here so I go over to the

doorway the room and in the hallway is

gray it’s very unclear like a terrible

black-and-white TV picture and there’s

men and women standing far away from the

light of the doorway

I said I’m sick I need to have surgery

I’ve been waiting all day for a doctor

and they said we know all about you

hurry come with us now we can’t wait any

longer come come all right

and I’m thinking okay

they’ve come they’ve come to take me to

the doctor this is great

your people as I left the light of the

room going into the hallway encircled me

and kind of started leading me in this

direction as we journeyed and there’s no

sense of time in any of this so when I

make time references it’s only for the

purposes of trying to make a rational

sequential story of this as we went it

got darker and darker and they came in

closer and closer and more and more of

them were around me and now as I asked

them questions like where are we going

how much further things like that they

started to become more rude and say

things to me like shut up

don’t ask questions you’ll find out

you’ll need to know keep moving keep

moving

move it you know like that I’m like

getting pretty intimidated that becomes

fear that becomes terror now this is

over a journey of miles and miles and

miles and eventually it’s so dark I’m

aware I can’t see anything anymore it’s

pitch black and I’ve I figured I’m done

you know I’ve had it and so I said I’m

not going any further and they said oh

yes you are

you’ve got further to go and I said I’m

not going and so they started to tug at

me and push at me what they were doing

was just playing with me playing with me

and at first it was pushing kicking

plane hitting and then that became

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biting and tearing would their

fingernails and hands and they were

taking

pieces of me and there was a lot of

laughter a lot of very foul language and

then they became more invasive there has

never been a horror movie or a book that

can begin to describe their cruelty

because their cruelty was pure purely

sadistic I know that they got nothing

out of it it was simply something to do

and I’m very aware that they were so

empty so without compassion or feeling

for me that it was just amusement for me

to scream and yell and fight back the

physical pain was pain from head to foot

just solid horrible acute pain on a

scale of one to ten ten total didn’t

begin to match what I felt on the inside

was you know um having been taken down

to nothing I mean the worst things that

you could possibly imagine had happened

to me and more and in that place I heard

a voice which I identify as my voice

except that it did not come out of my

throat off my lips but I do feel is

strange but I feel like it came out of

my chest this voice said pray to God and

I thought I don’t believe in God I don’t

pray the voice said pray to God and I

thought I don’t even know how to pray I

couldn’t pray if I wanted to pray the

voice said pray to God

and I thought when I was a boy and gone

to Sunday school we had been taught

prayers

what were those prayers so I’m searching

for anything that I’d remembered as a

child our Father who art in heaven I

remember like these phrases out of

prayers and I’m start to mutter this

stuff and the people around me

absolutely can’t bear it and so in

language that has never been heard in

this world obscene filthy vulgar

language they’re saying to me the the

content of which is there is no God

nobody can hear you and now you are

going to really be hurt you think what

you’ve experienced so far as something

wait until we’ve got for you now now

this made me want to pray more because

for the first time I was able to hit

back at them the prayers were like

clobbering well they left me alone

so now I have eternity time without

measure to think about my situation and

I thought about my life and as I

considered my life which would take me

days to talk over what I thought about

but summing up with as a son to my

mother and father I had filled them I

had not been a good husband to my wife

and you can use your imagination to

figure out what that means but it’s

that’s true that’s all true I have not

been the father to my kids that I should

have been and I knew I hadn’t because I

was busy I was trying to be somebody you

know like the football games and the

band concerts and the choral concerts

and theater performances that could all

wait because I was busy being important

I was doing stuff making myself into

somebody and I hated my life and I

realized that I belong with these people

in this place the only problem was is I

didn’t want to be with those people

because I knew that the only way to

survive in this role

if you don’t want to be a victim anymore

you’ve got to be meaner crueler than

they are you’ve got to be the victimizer

and not the victim

this memory comes of myself as a little

boy sitting in a Sunday School class

room singing jesus loves me when I

thought he why would he care about me

even if he is why would he here he must

hate me I’m so sorry and I thought

enough of this I’ve done I don’t have

anything else Jesus please save me and

when I said that I saw a light

tiny little speck of light and it very

rapidly got very bright and came over me

and I saw out of the light hands and

arms emerge out of this impossibly

beautiful white light those arms went on

me and healed me they went behind my

back and he picked me up as if it was no

effort on his part he just gently picked

me up and held me up against him real

tight up against his chest so there I am

with my arms around him his arms around

me and I am bawling like a baby and he

starts to rub my back like he wasn’t

saying there there but it was just like

like a mom or a dad with a child and I

knew

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I don’t I don’t know how I knew but I

knew he loved me very much just the way

I was

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