Angels Sing

‘Come, Desire of Nations, come,
Fix in Us thy humble Home,
Rise, the Woman's Conquering Seed,
Bruise in Us the Serpent's Head.

Now display thy saving Power,
Ruined Nature now restore,
Now in Mystic Union join
Thine to Ours, and Ours to Thine.’

Geissel milked his injury for days.  Worse still, he did it while singing Christmas carols, Hark the Herald being his favourite.  Most of them couldn’t cope with it so they vacated the wounded animal’s area as he lay on the cabin sofa, joyfully rattling off seasonal tunes, occasionally stopping to issue a melodramatic wince.  Walter was the only one who didn’t seem to be bothered by it.  Quite happy he was to attend to Geissel’s needs, provide ventilation for his whims.  Esprits de corps and all.  He was by now well-used to the career priest’s sappiness, a tendency which made him appear often like a cloyingly dull senator pleading for affection from the senate floor; but Walter enjoyed Geissel’s company, and was amused by his sentimentalism – perhaps only as it outperformed his own.

‘Tell me what you saw on your space travels, Walter.  Tell me about this island we are going to.’

‘There is not much else to say other than what I have already conveyed.  Ice.  Strange mountains.  A place unpeopled.

‘But you said your wife was from there?  Where did all the people go?’

‘I do not know.  I had but a glimpse.  And there was no human settlement from what I saw.  But: I was hit by a feeling of presence.  A discarnate presence.’

‘Ah -- well, you’re not the first.’

‘But this feeling was not divine or superhuman like your God.  It seemed human, but lost.  A lost humanness.  Like an unrecorded history was calling out to be found, except all I could feel was....its unattainability.  I thought I heard voices.  Whispered voices.  Though they didn’t seem to be saying anything.’

‘A strange dream indeed.’

‘Not a dream.  It was a projection.’

‘A strange projection then.  I wouldn’t say it was God.  I doubt that He would be out that far, out in that cold.  You need a break from time to time, even from your omnipresence.  Would you mind topping up my tea, Walter?’

‘Certainly.’

‘Oh, you’re a true gent, you are.  God save the Danish.'

‘Joyful all ye Nations rise,
Join the Triumph of the Skies,
Universal Nature say
"Christ the Lord is born Today!’