Waiting for Our Lord God Jesus Christ…

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…in the Maple Leaf Lounge at the John G. Diefenbaker Airport in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.

Assdeep in chair, Molsoned, enGlobed, my hands
Purelled, clean, my heart unfibrillating,
I touch nothing.

My hands are clean, I have washed myself of
It, the dirty thing, that cannot be seen,
prokaryotic microorganism,
that invisible thing that makes me shit
unwinding, violent rivers of shit,
praying to God in Marriott bathrooms
when I would rather be meeting with the
Western reps in Milwaukee or Scottsdale
or Denver or Calgary, when I would
rather stand and wait in the buffet line
at the Hilton President, Kansas City,
contemplating Danish and omelette, when
I would rather be waiting for Our Lord
God Jesus Christ in the Maple Leaf Lounge
at the John G. Diefenbaker Airport
in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy
on me, a sinner. My hands are clean.
I touch nothing.

Mostly, we are silent and we
are celibate and obedient and we
have eschewed material comfort and want
for nothing. God watches over us: he
is delicious and savoury; he is
a slice of Kraft cheddar or Edam, he
is a saltine and a Pringle and a
package of trail mix. This beer is his blood.
We’re surrounded by sacrament, assdeep
in the wonder of his works. And when we
rise above the clouds, we promise to not
look down on him in his heaven, instead,
to memorize the location of the
nearest exits, and to keep our tables
and trays upright and in the locked
position for takeoff and landing.

There are other martyrs in the Maple
Leaf Lounge at the John G. Diefenbaker
Airport in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.
The bumped and unAeroplanned, the old men
and women whose baggage exceeds their
carry-on allowance. We do not
look at them. They are in God’s hands now. We
look instead outside the window, past the
iron birds, the metal angels, to the aspen parklands,
Martensville, Prince Albert, North Battleford,
past the teetotalled boundaries set
by the Temperance Colonization
Society, devoted to sober
industry and land speculation, from
Clark’s Crossing to Moose Woods; we look beyond
to the graves of frozen Indians, Chief Rain-
in-the-Face and Big Wampum, Running Bear
and Tonto, naked graves for the frozen smiling
heathens, Rod Naistus, Larry Wegner, Neil
Stonechild, cold happy martyrs, tourists,
frozen in time, reminding us that all things
come to those who wait, especially if
what they are waiting for is death.

Inside the Maple Leaf Lounge at the John
G. Diefenbaker Airport in Saskatoon,
Saskatchewan, I check the departure screen,
I reread my boarding pass. Heather will
call my row number soon, and I will think
of her husband Roy back in Winnipeg,
who does or does not have lung cancer (the
doctors are not yet sure). Time is running
out. I want to be forgiven, but I
am comfortable. I want to wash in
Your grace, but the incoming passengers
are already deplaning. I will cleanse my
hands again, destroying microscopic
connections, and wait for my turn to stow my
carry-on luggage safely on the floor
under the seat in front of me or in
the nearest available overhead
compartment. And when the rapture comes, Lord
Jesus Christ, Son of God, to the Maple
Leaf Lounge at the John G. Diefenbaker
Airport in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan,
have mercy on me, a sinner, for I have
listened to the pronouncements and have
restricted gels and liquids, I have snapped my
safety belt, I have ensured—hallelujah!—
that my seat is in the full upright position,
I have promised that, in the unlikely
event of a loss of cabin pressure, I
will place the oxygen mask over my
mouth and nose, and breathe normally, and that
if I am travelling with a small child,
I will secure my mask first, and then help
the child secure hers. And so I wait as the
pimpled security guard checks his iPhone,
and wipes his hand on his shirt sleeve
and tries to stifle a yawn as he wishes
he was anywhere but here.