My first confession
On kneeling and Heaven
It is just past three. I sit in the sun, watching the window panes cast their reflection onto the hardwood floor. I move the mirror around the apartment. I shatter the mirror to test my luck. I listen to the men outside speak Spanish to each other and I fall asleep. They are my lullaby. I am alone and I hear myself too clearly. I become afraid again and realize that I am Fear. I am my own Fear and I turn into it because I want to. Now I touch my face and it is wet and a hot wind blows through the open window welcoming a horsefly. There is something inside me that has rotted and needs removing.
Also, I can see how easily people become afraid of the world, of outside.
As the days pass the night gets further away. I worry it will only soon be just a memory, like so many things are now, some closer than others. I want to live inside the memory. Why is that things an instant before they happen already seem to have happened?1 Again my ribs are creaking. Again they tell me. Again I tell me. There’s the neon white moon again showing it’s feathers.
I always find myself in this position: kneeling.
On my bed I look up at the ceiling, clasping my hands together. I look up at the ceiling because that’s what people do when they pray and want to talk to God. They look up at the ceiling and they close their eyes. So I looked up there and closed my eyes and I said outloud please help me please what am I going to do and God didn’t answer me and then I thought how could God be real if this is happening and then God finally spoke and he said you have to wait until I tell you and then you must do what I say and then I said Grandmother are you there God isn’t listening to me please help me please how can I do this alone and she didn’t answer either so then I didn’t believe in God or Grandmother anymore and I wanted to see if I could go visit them instead and see if I could touch Them with my hands and fingers.
So I got in my station wagon and started driving completely up vertically which no one else can do but me and eventually I arrived at a mountain wherein the road to the peak was arranged in a perfect twisty twirl. I drove a long time up that hill and finally made it to where I thought I’d be able to enter Heaven and ask for forgiveness and tell God that he needed to help me, but when I got there I was alone still and I couldn’t reach him. So I then thought well I’m going to try flying really high, maybe He’ll be there. I’m going to be the first human who learned how to fly so she could talk to God. So I got a running start and ran as fast as I could into the portal where Heaven was.
I remembered going to confession before I was given my Holy Communion and I said God please forgive me for I have sinned it’s been my whole life since my last confession, for these and all the sins of my past life I’m truly sorry and the priest said ok do three Hail Marys and you will be forgiven. So now I thought well it must be that easy I must be able to just look at the ceiling and say help me please forgive me I know I was wrong I know please forgive me. Except the priest isn’t here and God doesn’t have a voice. So I imagined another world where God speaks to me and he says: do everything I say and I’ll grant your every wish.
Clarice Lispector