The Nexus Collection: Draggie: Biscuits

Biscuits

Two thousand years later, give or take a year, he came back.
He didn't stay long, just dropped in for the day.
He ignored the Pope, but made a special trip to Canterbury, to
call the Archbishop a git. Then he dropped into the pub, shouted
a round, and gave us all two biscuits each. He was gone by five.
"Eat one yourself", he told us, "And give the other to a stranger..."

That's how it started.

Now there's magic in the air, a whiff of potency in every breath,
Any and all wishes granted, just as you would have them be,
But without the boredom.

Julian walked out of the pub that day and looked at the darkening sky,
He said, "If those clouds would bugger off, it'd be a beautiful night",
And so it was; the clouds just shrugged and drifted off who knows where.

The only thing that surprised me about that was that I wasn't surprised,
Haven't clouds always done that when I've asked?
So I tried, without success, to bring them back.

I gave my other biscuit to the kid who sells newspapers on the corner,
He can walk now, and smile - what's more, he's upped the price,
And he's selling them all, every day; that's why he's smiling, I'll bet!

It's been two weeks now, and I never thought peace could be so exciting,
I was always cynical about how boring heaven would be and how we needed
A bit of drama in our lives to make them interesting. I'm happily wrong.

The Aids epidemic ended last week, and the folks in Zaire are talking,
Saddam forgave the yanks, the Jews forgave the Germans, and the catholics
Are in a sulk.

I haven't eaten my biscuit yet, I can't even tell which was the original,
There are now five of them. Julian was always the generous one, he says he's
Shipping truckloads of them out to Third World countries.

I believe him.