Ceili’S Confession 1957.

After the bless me father for I have sinned entrance words you are stumped momentarily and look around the darkened space of the confessional knowing that on the other side of the mesh wire the priest is waiting sitting there with his ear turned toward you and his eyes probably closed allowing all his focus to be placed on you but there is nothing more and your mind panics to remember all the sins that a few minutes ago were flooding through your mind like a stream unleashed and tumbling over you to the degree that you thought you would need more than one session of confessions to get through it all but now you are silent as nothing will come forth and open out and pour forth and you stare at the grille and hope to God that the priest whether Father Goyle or Father Spawn will not tutt tutt as either one of them is liable to do if kept too long what with the others waiting their turn to unload and the priests wanting their lunch after the mass and other duties and those odd one or two people who think the priests have nothing more to do than listen to their gripes and pains and you tap your head slightly hoping that will bring out the sins from their hiding place and you know that one or two had to do with the picnic in the countryside with Eric and you know you ought not to have gone him being a married man and all but you couldn’t resist and you quite fancied him and that way he had and his good looks and his wife you told yourself didn’t deserve him anyway what with the way she treated him and how she would let him out of her sight and then the sins came flooding through and you settled back on your haunches allowing your bottom to rest there and open your lips to speak and it came out at such a rush almost tumbling over each other that the priest you felt was wanting you to slow down to allow him to take all into account and take measure of all that you were saying but the words just came and the sins rushed by with such a gush and speed that you felt slightly elated by the whole emptying of sins and words and images and deeds and sights the feeling in your groin that maybe the priest was uncertain if you had let go of your senses and had become slightly unhinged and was at that moment ready to tutt tutt and say not so fast not so quickly my child allow God to enter permit me to hear all at a pace that will let me judge fairly and for God to know and forgive and bless but you go on and on and the words come tumbling out like naughty children out to play and be at mischief and the memory of you and Eric and that shallow dip and his coat upon the grass and he kissing you and you undoing him and that for a few seconds flushes you and you hesitate and wonder if you had spoken of that and released that or was it just memory and not revealed and the priest you imagine as you falter with words is sitting upright his eyes wide open his mouth agape and his hands wringing themselves in uncertainty and you mutter now like a child that these and other sins you cannot now recall are before him and God and you are sorry for the committing of them and remorseful and ask for God’s mercy and blessing and you wonder as you hear the movements of the priest on the other side of the grille whether he will dress you down before absolution like some priests do almost father like in their sternness at least your father with his dark eyes and large smacking hand or whether this priest will be mellow and merciful and hand down a few pearls of wisdom before absolution and give you a penance of a few Ave Marias or Pater Nosters and you hear the priest cough and whisper and splutter slightly as he leans close to the grille and proceeds to unload a sermon off the mount and you sit back hoping that God in his own place will be listening with more patience and understanding and not worry too much if the penance is no more than a rushed prayer at bedtime or the going without of a so much wanted bar of chocolate as you later sit by the window watching the moon gaze from its small spot in the night sky.1