By Gale Acuff
I haven’t got a lot of time left, Miss
Hooker’s my Sunday School teacher and she
says that the world can end any time it
pleases God to end it, how He could be
pleased is beyond me but then so is He
and for that matter Miss Hooker, too, I
might never grow up to ask her out on
a date and I can’t very well ask her
now since I’m only 10 to her 25
so I need for God to hold off on His
Divine Plan, if it is His plan, that’s what
Miss Hooker says and she seems to know what
she’s talking about as if she got it
from the man himself, I mean God, of course,
so now I’m not sure what to pray for, Come
Lord Jesus or I’m not quite ready yet
for the end of everything and me just
ten lousy years old but Miss Hooker says
Children, it’s time for you all to get saved
if you’re not saved yet and I know for sure
that a few of you aren’t, and she looked right
at me, almost through me, maybe the way
God would, maybe Jesus, too, but then He
seems at least a little kinder, tonight
I’ll pray to Him to hold His Father off
from blowing the universe to pieces
and then, I guess, blowing the pieces to
atoms or even less, so much less it’s
nothing, but then Jesus said somewhere I
and the Father are one, which is bad news
for me and Sweet Romance. Before things fall
apart I’m going to tell Miss Hooker
how much I love her and even though I’m
just a boy and not a man I’ll go for
anything of love a boy can have that’s
still legal and righteous. Or maybe not
–wouldn’t it be funny if Miss Hooker
came to me and told me that she feels just
like I feel for her? Not that she could know
unless maybe by some miracle but
I think that would scare me to death and if
so I won’t have to be alive to see
the end of everything two times over.
It would be something if we were holding
hands when the end comes or even kissing.
I guess that it would be our honeymoon.
