Sunrise with Sea Monster Read Online Free
Author: Neil Jordan
am suspect. I know in my heart the intimate rituals the priest circumscribes in the sandy
air with his thin white hands. I welcome them secretly as a hint of home. I stand out of some obscure sense of fellowship
but it is neither exhaustion nor the angular pebbles on the soles of my feet that make me want to kneel. I would slip downwards
with relief, would welcome their contempt, would put myself outside once more another sphere of approval. And if I let my
heart quicken the way it wants to, tears maybe would stream down my own sandy cheeks. I can remember those walks on Sunday
down the promenade, both of us in our best suits, to the church on Sydney Parade. Those neighbours who passed us would nod,
their faces set in what came to seem a permanent mask of condolence. The sea would change, from white-capped to still, steely
grey, I would grow, my suit would change, my height would gain on his but the walk was sacrosanct and the hush of the church
interior was always the same. I will go to the altar of God, to God the joy of my youth. There was a shocking relief in the
silence there, in the knowledge that we could abide together amidst this ritual, and as with the nightlines, not have to blunder
towards speech. So I came to think of God as a great mass of quiet, a silence that was happy with itself, a closed mouth.
Till the time came when I would interrupt that quiet.
I remember Mouse, his face perplexed and saddened among the surging crowds who tried to block us from the boat on Eden Quay.
He walked with me from the house towards Bray station, past the sea to our left and the large Victorian piles to our right.
He reminded me of the hawker he'd seen in Greystones, scattering broken glass out of a sack to gather the crowds. We'd bet
our souls on whether he would bleed when he lay on them. You won Mouse, I told him. Nobody wins a bet like that, he said.
We turned up from the sea by the Northern Hotel past the Legio Maria pebbledash front with the Virgin holding the ball of
the known world, towards the train. What'll he do without you, Mouse said. He had come to be more Christian than I. He'll
have her, I told him. And more to the point, what will you do without me. He sniffed in the cold air and brushed his black
hair from his perfect forehead. I'm going for prelims next month, he said. He would pretend to me his application to a seminary
was to provide him with a cheap degree, but I knew the reality. He had found God with a vengeance. And then, I asked him,
lying, as he wanted me to. Maybe teaching. The train came and I said, you don't have to come any farther. Why not? he asked.
There'll be a demonstration at the boat, I told him. You shouldn't be seen with the likes of me. But he shut me up with a
glance of contempt and opened the carriage door.
Rose had declined to come that day and my father had stood by the living-room window, with his face turned to the sea once
more. You're too young, he said, to take a step like this. Was I ever too young? I asked him. Why do you think you're so different?
he asked me. I don't, I said. You don't choose conflict, he said, war and hate and all that, it chooses you. So it chose you
once, I said. That was different, he said. What I can't take any more, I said, is the hypocrisy, the prevarication—Don't give
me politics, he said, I know all that. Just tell me what it is. You know what it is, I told him. I don't, he said, I honestly
don't. Then look at me and tell me that, I asked him. But I turned and left before he had a chance to.
You've got him wrong, Mouse said as the train soughed past Killiney. Maybe, I said, but doing something is better than nothing.
What do you mean? Mouse asked. The heroic act, I told him, is as apt a metaphor as any for this condition we call life. The
contemplation of it sweet, the execution tortuous and the end product vacuous. You'll have to translate for me, said Mouse.
If I stayed what would I do?
air with his thin white hands. I welcome them secretly as a hint of home. I stand out of some obscure sense of fellowship
but it is neither exhaustion nor the angular pebbles on the soles of my feet that make me want to kneel. I would slip downwards
with relief, would welcome their contempt, would put myself outside once more another sphere of approval. And if I let my
heart quicken the way it wants to, tears maybe would stream down my own sandy cheeks. I can remember those walks on Sunday
down the promenade, both of us in our best suits, to the church on Sydney Parade. Those neighbours who passed us would nod,
their faces set in what came to seem a permanent mask of condolence. The sea would change, from white-capped to still, steely
grey, I would grow, my suit would change, my height would gain on his but the walk was sacrosanct and the hush of the church
interior was always the same. I will go to the altar of God, to God the joy of my youth. There was a shocking relief in the
silence there, in the knowledge that we could abide together amidst this ritual, and as with the nightlines, not have to blunder
towards speech. So I came to think of God as a great mass of quiet, a silence that was happy with itself, a closed mouth.
Till the time came when I would interrupt that quiet.
I remember Mouse, his face perplexed and saddened among the surging crowds who tried to block us from the boat on Eden Quay.
He walked with me from the house towards Bray station, past the sea to our left and the large Victorian piles to our right.
He reminded me of the hawker he'd seen in Greystones, scattering broken glass out of a sack to gather the crowds. We'd bet
our souls on whether he would bleed when he lay on them. You won Mouse, I told him. Nobody wins a bet like that, he said.
We turned up from the sea by the Northern Hotel past the Legio Maria pebbledash front with the Virgin holding the ball of
the known world, towards the train. What'll he do without you, Mouse said. He had come to be more Christian than I. He'll
have her, I told him. And more to the point, what will you do without me. He sniffed in the cold air and brushed his black
hair from his perfect forehead. I'm going for prelims next month, he said. He would pretend to me his application to a seminary
was to provide him with a cheap degree, but I knew the reality. He had found God with a vengeance. And then, I asked him,
lying, as he wanted me to. Maybe teaching. The train came and I said, you don't have to come any farther. Why not? he asked.
There'll be a demonstration at the boat, I told him. You shouldn't be seen with the likes of me. But he shut me up with a
glance of contempt and opened the carriage door.
Rose had declined to come that day and my father had stood by the living-room window, with his face turned to the sea once
more. You're too young, he said, to take a step like this. Was I ever too young? I asked him. Why do you think you're so different?
he asked me. I don't, I said. You don't choose conflict, he said, war and hate and all that, it chooses you. So it chose you
once, I said. That was different, he said. What I can't take any more, I said, is the hypocrisy, the prevarication—Don't give
me politics, he said, I know all that. Just tell me what it is. You know what it is, I told him. I don't, he said, I honestly
don't. Then look at me and tell me that, I asked him. But I turned and left before he had a chance to.
You've got him wrong, Mouse said as the train soughed past Killiney. Maybe, I said, but doing something is better than nothing.
What do you mean? Mouse asked. The heroic act, I told him, is as apt a metaphor as any for this condition we call life. The
contemplation of it sweet, the execution tortuous and the end product vacuous. You'll have to translate for me, said Mouse.
If I stayed what would I do?
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