High as the Horses' Bridles: A Novel Read online

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  For Kate before, now, and after

  CONTENTS

  Title Page

  Copyright Notice

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Woe to the Land Whose Child Is King

  The Ends

  EAST- 1

  WEST- 2

  EAST- 3

  EAST AND WEST- 4

  No More Dominion

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Apocalypse is our history.

  —James Berger,

  “Twentieth-Century Apocalypse:

  Forecasts and Aftermaths,”

  Twentieth Century Literature,

  vol. 46, no. 4 (Winter 2000)

  WOE TO THE LAND WHOSE CHILD IS KING

  QUEENS, NEW YORK, 1980

  They sit.

  Below a painted ceiling looming high overhead, they sit and they wait. The ceiling yawns, stretching like one vast wing warming oh so many eggs.

  See the stars, the affixed points of light, the glowing striated mists of silvery cloud. See the night clouds lolling, drifting above their heads across an expanse of blue plaster sky. Like vapors released, dust climbs blue-gray and upward like prayers.

  Now, see the ceiling stretch outward and above the seated people, this for all of one hundred feet, over and above the lettered rows A through Z, double-A and onward—on and above, across the grand room of ceramic, marble, and wood. Heels click and rubber soles pat, the sounds bouncing off here, and there, up through open space like swimmers ascending for air. And above every head, the sky stretches on toward brassy balcony railings, sloping down from the armpit arch of the ceiling’s rounded center. Steeping downward, over the balcony railing—not even one foot resting there—then, just as you’d expect, the tiered seating rises even higher. Their heads are closer to the ceiling up there, with hair well combed and slicked.

  Clip-on ties by the hundreds, a few full Windsor knots and occasional spit-shined wingtips on the congregation elders, the men who drove their families. No buses, no trains, not ever. They are in the aisle seats, more leg room. The wives ask their husbands, “Are you comfortable?”

  In the central seats, see the suit jackets and ill-fitting corduroy, all very tasteful and clean, but not new, not even close. There’s no small amount of pride in their faces, and their hand-me-down clothing. The black kids from Jackson Heights, the Hispanic kids from Ozone Park, and the pink-faced Irish from Astoria will rush the aisles come intermission, and they’ll say, “Excuse me,” stepping on the elders’ fancy shoes. They will parade the building halls and call to each other, cruising, and flirting, asking which church the cute boy goes to. And the Indian girls from Richmond Hill, the Korean boys from Flushing. Their parents will gather for lunch and then approach the elder men, and pay them proper respect. Mothers wear skirts that reach below their knees. Any shorter and they risk a talking-to.

  But first they sit. They face the empty stage, awaiting the opening song and prayer, the first speaker of the day to take the stage.

  Not just any stage beneath any painted sky. Up there, you’ll find no less than the heavens of Venice. You want proof—the famed Rialto Bridge, one tenth of its original size, a reconstruction, spans the top width of the stage. The favorite bridge in a City of Bridges, burned once, twice fallen, and both times a crowd collapsed with it. Down they fell under the waters of Venice. Which means the audience, here, in the grand Queens Howard Theater, tucked on a wide city street between a mechanic’s garage and a Mexican takeout, are assembled in something like a dry canal. More than four thousand worshippers sitting, and anxiously waiting for the day’s first prayer for His Kingdom Come on Earth as It Will Be in Heaven, and the long falling rain of salvation, falling stars, blackened sun, and fiery burning rain, for the coming of His Holy War and Christ. They pray for Armageddon, End of Ends, Great Bringer of all meaning in Death. And the worshippers are both a sum and parts, a throng, a sea of people beneath a decorative replica of the real-world Rialto. But, sure as any day, you can walk this bridge spanning the Howard’s stage, and some actually do, mostly maintenance men tending to the delicate bridge’s woodwork. Like a painted crown it spans the stage beneath the stars of Venice, City of Bridges, of Water, of Light.

  Howard Theater, Theater of Lights, every heavenly star is here.

  What does all this say about us sitters? There is a kinship with the city itself, its ever-reconfigured paths, boatways, and alleyways, all searching out new ways of seeking, just the right place for New Venetians. Heirs of the city’s favorite son, Marco Polo, poster boy for journeyers, brave and faithful seeker of unknown truths, seer of this world, and carrier of Holy Oil, gift giver of Christ to the yellow men. More than four thousand of his heirs, sitting here, beneath a faux Rialto, awaiting a description of this world. And the next.

  * * *

  Backstage, behind the hanging curtain, the boy is clearly nervous. Hungry and nervous. He can’t keep still. He’s done nothing like this before, and certainly not here. Worse, he needs to go to the restroom. Feet shuffling in place, had way too much orange juice, he tries to sneak a look toward the front rows where he saw his parents seated earlier this morning. They always sit up front at church, something Dad practically can’t not do. Up front, as close as they can, Dad on the aisle, Mom beside. A pale vessel. Dad has even asked people to move before, said he can’t concentrate sitting anywhere else. Sometimes lately he’s been sitting, and then standing again, and then sitting. Standing. Like he can’t help himself, trying to get his place relative to the stage just right. There they are: Mom with her long red curls, and Dad wearing a stern face, looking like he’s in charge. But who’s in charge anymore? Just this morning they had a fight and told Josiah to please leave the kitchen.

  From the stage, the great room seems even bigger than it was this morning, how many stories tall, and the ceiling feels like a window into dark and never-ending space. How spaceships look from the inside, he figures. When he first walked in and his parents looked for their seats, and he stood there, looking up, the great sky opened above him. He imagined two suns, just like in Star Wars, and a butter-yellow moon between them. A rocket shooting like a star. But now the room is bigger, much bigger than what his brain can comprehend, because the place is full of people. The people make the ceiling seem higher. The lamp bulbs looming, glowing and alive with light, hot and actual. Like the roof has been blown, and here is this place filled with—Dad said the unthinkable number this morning, in the station wagon, on the way here. “Say it with me slowly, son: four thousand people.” Of course, he’s heard the number before, but not in any way like this, not seeing it made real, four thousand bodies. He’s certainly never spoken to so many before. He goes cold as he peeks through the curtains. He sees the pastor, Elder Brother Kizowski, approach the microphone and check his wristwatch as he walks. The stragglers are taking to their seats.

  Josiah remembers a blueberry muffin, is sure he saw a tray of them this morning, out there, somewhere, maybe by the food tables.

  A quick run to the restroom, and maybe he can find that tray of muffins. Feet shuffling, he needs to get his father’s attention. He needs permission to leave the stage, so he can go to the bathroom. He can never seem to hold his father’s attention, not for very long anyway, and especially when it’s not about worship. Even when his fat
her does talk with Josiah about God, it’s almost like the boy isn’t there. At least this is how he feels, like his father is looking right through him, to some other place and some other time, like he’s seeing someone else entirely. Josiah wants his father to see him. Twelve years old, light as twigs, he spreads the curtains and eases his head forward, onstage, the cloth falling around him like a robe. Josiah, the size of a full-breasted bird, of a sapling elm, made small by the height of the hanging curtains, fire tongues reaching up to darkness.

  Brother Bob Pullsey approaches him.

  Bob Pullsey is a tall man, tall as two Josiahs stacked. He has the face of the men Josiah has seen sitting alone on Forest Park benches. In his sixties, Pullsey is old for an assistant servant, not yet an elder, not one of the older men of distinction, the elder shepherds of this great fleshly flock. Today he’s in charge of the onstage amplified sound.

  “Brother Pullsey,” Josiah says, a little bit loud.

  He’s seen before how this older man is set apart from the other older men. He’s one of them, but also not one of them, and Josiah thinks he likes that. But Pullsey makes him uneasy, too. Josiah gets a queasy feeling in his stomach sometimes when he sees men not like the others. If God rewards those who worship him, why is the old man still handling microphones and helping elder brothers half his age? Josiah doesn’t like math, but this seems like a bad equation, something doesn’t add up. He knows that God is supposed to reward.

  He calls to Brother Pullsey again. But Pullsey puts a finger to his lips—Shhh, I’ll be right back—as he walks toward the pastor onstage.

  The pastor, Elder Brother Thad Kizowski, is locally famous for his mid-sermon animated gestures. But his aren’t the wild gesticulations you see on Sunday morning TV. He’s not your televangelist preacher who cries and wails in an Easter-colored suit, the kind that reasons with the camera, a salesman for the divine. A serious man, Brother Kizowski is especially serious today. This is the inaugural morning worship of a half week’s convention here in a newly purchased theater. Every New York congregation, even some from out of state, friends in Christ from across the great ministerial map who have thicker wallets have focused their prayers and financial efforts on this for going on five years now. They have filled up donation boxes with children’s change, quarters, nickels, dimes, and spare adult dollar bills, and sometimes paychecks Pay to the Order of … The Lord has seen fit this year to provide them, for the first time, a place of their own for large conventions. A place to congregate, and feel as one. A new home.

  Kizowski is a gray-haired Polish man who buried his father not two weeks ago, a camp survivor undone by a bathtub slip and fall. Kizowski’s hands remain motionless and at his sides for much of the time, except for when, like in karate, they cut the air to punctuate a special point or phrase. Slice upward when you speak of Heaven, to the side when you speak of Earth. Brother Kizowski, in his dog-brown suit, straightens his back and lapel, and waits for the bustle in the great room to settle. He welcomes the crowd as Bob Pullsey walks onstage.

  “Good morning, brothers and sisters!”

  Kizowski waves to the audience with both hands and nods at approaching Brother Pullsey. And at first they’re all of them out there wondering, even Josiah, what’s this, why is Brother Pullsey onstage with the pastor? Pullsey whispers something into the pastor’s ear …

  Kizowski booms: “What a special day on God’s good Earth! Is it not?”

  But now it’s clear, even kind of comic, why Pullsey is interrupting the speaker. It’s the microphone—the threaded grip has loosened, and the mic is slowly shrinking down inside its metal sleeve. With Kizowski’s hands slicing out, the way he does, and with the mic stand lowering, Kizowski appears to be growing in stature, like he’s levitating just above the floor. The mic continues to slide slowly down. A staggered laugh moves through the crowd, slightly checked but growing steadily. You never really know when to laugh in church. Especially when Kizowski’s onstage.

  He steps back from the microphone to let Pullsey have his way with the stand, and he gives the audience a cold sneer. Accidental maybe, annoyed at the timing, he’s just gotten started for goodness’ sake. He pulls exaggeratedly at his collar. “Really, I mean I’m standing here telling the truth, brothers and sisters, the life-giving waters are flowing. And maybe, just maybe I’m getting carried away.” He looks up. “Is my time up already, Heavenly Father? Is this a message, the vaudeville hook? We haven’t even had the morning song and prayer yet!” And the entire theater breaks into laughter, a hearty family-table peal of laughter, laughter of relief. Kizowski’s just like us.

  “But seriously, brothers and sisters. This is a very special day. Our first day in this new House of God.” He’s backed up considerably from the microphone now, hardly within its reach. Test those lungs, and talk to the cheap seats: “Can you all hear me out there?”

  A throaty and high-pitched “Yes!” from the back row answers for all.

  “Good,” Kizowski says. “Because I just might save your life!” Some more hesitant laughter from the crowd as Bob Pullsey continues to wrestle with the mic stand. He takes a step back and stares at the mic as if willing it to stay put. It finally does.

  “Thank you, Brother Pullsey. Do all of you know Brother Pullsey? No, I’m sure you don’t. We have how many here? More than four thousand, I’m told, from all five New York boroughs. Even Kansas City! I met a sister who came all the way here from Kansas City! But state and borough lines don’t matter in here, not even your ballot! Because we’ve cast our vote for Christ, for the one true God and His Heavenly Kingdom. Let it rule from Heaven over Earth, and over His ever faithful subjects. And are we not faithful? Are we not proud of our Lord God who has paved the way for an authentic service, a fine, clean worship just like our first-century brothers and sisters? And is our God not so generous to provide for us this beautiful house to congregate and have fellowship in these Last Days? A place for us to meet, and associate, and encourage. For today we sit within the House of God!” In a stretched, extended position, he appears to be mid-dive. His pants cuffs lift, revealing three inches of hairless pink ankle. “Are we not a cared-for people? A curious people in search of the unbound soul? Are we not explorers of a true metaphysic? And who else could lead this great expedition but our one true Heavenly Father? Now let us show an appreciation for the brothers and sisters who have worked so hard to get his house ready, brothers like our Brother Pullsey. Welcome to this year’s convention, this year’s New York chapter of Brothers and Sisters in the Lord!”

  There is a thundering of applause, and Kizowski himself is clapping as Bob Pullsey bows to the crowd.

  * * *

  Up there, in the balcony, claps Sister Hilda Famosa. She claps for the pastor, and for his speech, but looking everywhere except the stage. She’s looking around for her family. Where are her boys? The service is starting and her family is nowhere in sight. She doesn’t need this kind of aggravation. Not to mention her vertigo. The seats are so high it’s making her flushed.

  No seats left on the main floor, so they had to sit in the balcony. Should’ve left the house at least an hour earlier, but nobody listens. And when you have to get two boys—no, wait, make it three because Havi brought his mejor amigo, little Issy, because his mother’s all high again, who knows where his father is, and all of them fighting for the shower this morning, plus a husband who keeps giving her trouble. Like she doesn’t have enough since Carlo Junior got his driver’s license. She’s never on time anymore. Why am I without my family? Havi and Issy said they were going to the bathroom, and that was twenty minutes ago. And so Carlo Senior went looking. You better go find mi revoltosos. And who knows where Carlo Junior is, lately chasing any rump that walks. And so their Bibles, and their jackets, and her snake-plastic purse all on the chairs beside her, so nobody tries to sit. She mumbles a prayer to herself, and wonders if this long suffering will make her a better bride for Christ.

  And everyone here, in different ways, wonder
s the very same thing. Will they make a good partner for Christ? But not in one way or in one voice, because this is not a collective power, the funneled strength of a crowd. No, it’s personal, a singular power, within each and every one where lives a now-blooming question: Does God know my name, and does He love me? Am I so lucky?

  My name is Hilda, and I scrub the grout and bathroom tiles of accountants and lawyers and their wives. She mouths these words: You love me, I know You love me. But where are my boys? The pitch is pretty steep and getting steeper with each stair and the red velvet chairs feel like bird perches, this high up. Her vertigo is getting even worse. The stars above a long ladder’s reach away. Her hands going pale as she grips the soft red armrest, the kind you find in old movie theaters. Well, that’s what she heard some people say anyway, that this place used to be a movie theater. Tiene sentido, but here? Why sit up here? Why not come early and sit down front? Nobody listens. And a little boy sitting by himself right in front of me. ¿Dónde está tu madre? If I’m not careful, and he turns, the boy will see up my skirt.

  The ceiling presses closer on the rows behind her, close, and coming down like a sandwich press meeting the way-back wall, stars and all, of the Queens Howard Theater. In any other theater in this world, a ticket taker dressed in cardinal red would stand up here with a handful of Playbills. But not here. Hilda has climbed to where the stairs stop, as far as you can go, where the ceiling becomes the wall. Where one of the maintenance men, Harold, from Brooklyn, fifty-six and round-faced, came all the way on the N train and walked how many blocks, has already lugged a gallon of paint from the first floor early this morning because some kid, probably not ten or twelve, a boy no doubt, stood up on his tiptoes and scratched away a star above BZ5. Where his father was forced to stoop, because like it or not the sky rushes down like a plaster-cast waterfall of stars. Be careful, or you just might crack your head.