So Many Gods Are Watching

We all have our gods, right? A lot of us are born into a faith, and with that, our gods are chosen. Even the atheists, though they say there is no god, make proof (or they would say, lack of it, in the case of god) and almighty science and reason their number one- that which is at the base of all, that which is causative, that which should hold the highest and most encompassing place in the space of a life or many lives or even, all time. Yep, you tell me, there is no god and I know you are simply unable, or unwilling, to recognize yours as such, which certainly does not mean you do not have one, or most likely, a few. These days, (and perhaps, it has always been such) even those who profess a one and only god, have at least some others to which they pay far greater homage.

Like most, my gods are those of my family. Unlike most, they came to us, specifically my great great grandmother, Selena, on a single night. You see, Selena was a passenger on the Titanic.

"On the night of April 15, 1912, I went out to the deck to look at the night sky. The stars were splendid, I remarked on this to a gentleman nearby. We spoke briefly of the beauty surrounding us and bid each other good night. I dreamt later of a baby nestled in a wheelbarrow piled high with flowers. When the baby was suddenly snatched up and thrown into the air, I awoke, startled, and thought to I settle myself with a look again at the stars. I encountered the same gentleman, seeming then, agitated and unaware. Suddenly, in recognizing my face, he grabbed my arms and began forcefully pulling me. Once I started struggling, he hoarsely said, "We are sinking." He continued to pull me along as I was in some state of not being able to comprehend what was happening around me. In nearing what I heard as an escalating buzz, I saw a baby fly through the air, and as we made our way into the buzz, I heard the baby cry. I looked down and saw that it was in a boat being lowered into the sea. I felt a sudden weight upon my shoulders. As the gentleman's coat settled itself around me, he whispered, "the stars are still shining..." and was gone. I was put into a lifeboat and the hours that passed were set to a horrific soundscape. Initially, it assaulted- the screams and the cries, the slosh and guggle of the water; it escalated- groaning metal, crashing glass, splintering wood, more screams, more cries; and then so many splashes, some whimpers and... nothing. It was the silence, sudden and accented with chattering, that buried itself deep within me and wrapped me tight. I do not remember boarding the Carpathia or much of the subsequent passage to New York. I did sense some sort of foment, though, churning within the bone-felt chill and sap of the daze I could not see past until... I saw Edgar."

Selena wrote this at my great great grandfather's urging. She urged him to do the same:

"I knew in the instant I heard of the Titanic striking an iceberg that I would have to be more- more than I ever thought myself capable of being, more than any imagining I might have of living my life as a husband, or (and this hit devastatingly quick), God forbid, as a widower. I kept going back to the word "unsinkable" and could not find faith in it. I just could not shake the creeping feeling I had. "Know humility" repeated itself again and again in my thoughts, as well as, "she is alive, she is alive, she is alive." I stood in that crowd at the pier waiting, felt the too many musing and speculations gristle against every inch of my body, and in the midst of my own doubt and faith, I dissolved into that space of wait. That was it- WAIT- and I did until... I saw her.

My great great grandparents together would tell their child about the hug they shared when they were reunited- the overwhelming relief and absolute safety they had felt and, with that, the ability and desire to begin to experience again. It had been a month, (and a seeming lifetime), since they had seen each other. Both were struck with a sense of having new lives, and as Selena had guessed, there was another life- one created before Edgar had left, that had somehow endured and was growing within her. He was, fittingly, born during an ice storm on 7 December of 1912. Selena and Edgar wrapped him in the gentleman's coat that night and said to the stars, "As I sit here in the darkness, the black of night matched by the black of the sea, I know the light of innumerable stars, they shine upon the formidable beauty of this life and this world, like so many gods watching with so many eyes."

They had found the poem in the gentleman's coat and believed its recitation would land rightly and, with the great gratitude they felt, upon the gentleman's soul. They hoped it might linger long enough that he would know of the child wrapped there in his coat.