A Letter Above & Beyond
By Cliff Harrison
Narrator:
The letter to Martha was sent far above and beyond, yet her voice could be heard so near.
The story goes that the man had problems—problems with adjustment. But in the end, he found a way to make the final adjustment and he had problems no more. The legend goes something like this:
Martha, it’s sooooo good to be writing to you again. I’ve missed you since we last talked. I don’t know why you don’t come visit me anymore. We used to enjoy one another’s company and now all there seems to be is… a blank.
I long for you, Martha.
You were the closest thing I ever had to a real mother, or even an auntie. You always held so much wisdom and you never complained when I was frightened. You always opened your arms for me, no matter how old I got or how silly my fright seemed to be.
I’m so alone now, Martha. Except for those dark, lonely nights when you come by to visit and have teas with me, it seems I’m always having day time dreams in the middle of the afternoon and I’m always waking up in the mist of a nightmare. Alone! All alone! Without you. Without you I am nothing. I never was.
I miss you, Martha. I long for those days when you held my head close to your breasts and the warmth of your bosom took away my fears. You could take away my most intense fears.
…but now those fears have returned, Martha. And, they are so evil and sooooo intense that I feel I can no longer fight them off. If only you were near.
I miss you sooooo much. I long for the time when we can be together again, a time when you can again hold me to your warm bosom and diminish my fears.
The fears have come back and they are so great. I try and I try to understand them. You could always understand them, somehow, but I never could.
The fears would just visit when they wanted to. I never had one word to say about it—or so it seems.
You had all the understanding, Martha.
Nobody ever gave you credit. To them you were just an old, old lady who was silly to be comforting a middle-age man with silly notions floating around inside his head. To other people, Martha, they thought you too, were crazy.
But not to me. You were always there. And when you were there the bad thoughts which lingered and hung inside my head like a meat hook
You were always there for me. Martha
And now… I am so alone. The fears just won’t go away. The noises just get louder all the time. The evil voices keep telling me to do bad things. You remember. I fear I’m gonna hurt someone, Martha.
I have to come to you. I will be with you soon. It is the only solution. I can’t bear to go on any longer. Without you the evil forces overwhelm me. I get dizzy holding my head and scream back at them. Crying all into the night, makes my pillow wet with misery. Cuddled into the fetal position crying myself to sleep, waking up and kicking and clawing back at them, I never get no peace.
Martha, I never had peace since you went away. Oh, when you came to visit I’d feel calm, but you’d always go away again. My homeless friends tell me that you’re not coming back ever again. I don’t believe them. But you know what. Martha, it don’t matter. It don’t matter no more. You know why? Because I’m coming to see you, Martha.
I hope you don’t get mad at me. I only remember once when you got mad at me. You know, you remember, that time when you were holding me to your bosom and I was a naughty boy. I know I shouldn’t have done what I did.
That was the only time I ever saw you mad. Why, you were so angry with me I thought you’d never let me cuddle up to your bosom again. And boy, were you mad at me.
I hope you don’t mind me stopping by when I come. As soon as I sent this letter off I’m gonna be on my way to see you. I’ve made all the preparations. You’ll see! I done it all alone, too. Nobody helped. Nobody ‘cept that guy on the street I traded my Social Security check for. He helped me. He helped me good. And he promised never to say a word and told me I should do the same. And I have. I never told nobody. And never will, ‘cept for you, Martha.
It’s raining now, Martha. Why does it always seem to rain when somebody goes away? Does God know I’m coming? Does he know I’m planning a visit with you? You always told me He knows everything, even the little things we hold on our mind.
I don’t believe one word of it. But you always said so, anyway. I mean no offense, Martha, but that’s like you telling me all those nursery rhymes you used to whisper to me while I was resting on your bosom and you’d be stroking my wet hair and whispering to me.
Oh, I wish we could do that again. Will you do that again, when I come visit, Martha? Will you hold me to your bosom and tell me nursery rhymes, whispering to me and stroking my hair and make the voices and all the noise in my head leaver? Will you do that for me, Martha? I promise not to be naughty. I never be naughty again. No, never again. Not with you.
The evil keeps coming back, Martha. That’s why I can’t stay here alone, no more.
I can’t never seem to get away from the hands of evil. You always told me to come to you whenever the evil came to me. But Martha, you are so far away. The only way I know how to get to you, Martha, is through the grapevine.
It’s raining, Martha. It’s starting to rain hard. I’ll wipe my feet off when I get to your house. But, I’ll be there soon. I can’t do it alone no more, Martha. No, no, I can’t. That’s why I’m coming to see you. I hope you don’t get mad. I long to hear your voice again. I long for you to take away the evil and remove the voices and all the noise from my head.
Martha, they want me to do evil things. They want me to kill people, Martha. And… I’m so afraid I will. It would be so easy. If I satisfy the voices in my head, maybe they will go away. But, you always told me, Martha, never ever to do what the evil voices told me to do. And… up until now, I always listened to you. Not them. No, not them.
But, Martha! You are so far away and they are so near. What do I do, Martha? There is only one thing I can do. And that is to come to you and come quickly. For, if I stay here and the evil voices misguide me like they always misguide me I’ll be a misguided person and you always told me to never be a misguided person.
It’s intense, Martha.
I can’t get one moment of peace no more. They won’t leave me alone for a single second. I can’t sleep. I can’t even take a nap in the middle of the afternoon without them pestering me like those rats used to in my old place. Those big, dirty, filthy, smelly rats! You remember them, don’t you, Martha.
These evil voices are worst than those stinking rats that used to pester me. They gnaw at my mind and keep chewing the fibers of my sanity away. I can’t take it no longer, it is driving me sooooo in sane. And I’m so afraid I’ll hurt someone because that’s what they want me to do, Martha.
The keep telling me, they keep chanting, they keep demand and insisting I take the life of someone nearby. Rather it be a little boy, or a little girl or some old lady like you, or a dirty prostitute or some drunken homeless bum in my neighborhood, they don’t care, they just want me to do something—something bad, Martha—something very bad.
Martha, they gave me pictures in my mind, videos and music so loud and clear showing me in my head everything that was going to happen in the future. It is always so clear and crisp. So clear and crisp you can smell the blood and hear the final screams and gurgling as their blood pours form them.
The show me all the time, Martha, almost on the hour. I almost did it once. I was laying on the couch minding me own business and I took a nap in the middle of the afternoon.
A little while later I hear this scream, this little girl was screaming and crying and her mother was calling for her. I could hear the mother’s voice echoing in my ear as she searched for her only child. But she never found her because I hid her really good just like he evil voices told me to. They showed me where I could hid her and nobody would ever know.
And then there was the time when I thought I was sleeping and I must have come away and saw this old, drunk man sitting in a box next to my box and he was singing and smiling and acting groovy and I told him to shut up and he wouldn’t shut and he laughed at me and he kept laughing. Well, he doesn’t laugh no more. The evil voices told me to shut him up and they told me how. And I watched it all go on in my head and Martha, you know what? That old, drunken bum that moved in next to my box never told me to shut up again. So, ma’am, he didn’t. Why I just beat the living piss out of him, Martha. Well, I know you never liked hearing the details, but it wasn’t pretty Martha. Nobody tells me to shut up and gets away with it. Nobody. And the evil voices saw to it that I made that old man mind his own business.
Martha, even in the middle of the afternoon I’m having nightmares. They haunt me no matter what time of the day it is, no matter where I go, no matter how often I tell them to leave they are just like those rats at my old place, gnawing and gnawing until I cave in.
I’ll be home by supper time, Martha. You keep the light on for me, so I can find my way in the darkness. I’ll wear my headphones and play my CDs on my CD player so I can’t hear the voices so much. Okay, Martha? Is that all right with you?
I better let you go, Martha. I’ve kept you way too long all ready.
Martha? Martha? Martha, is that you, or is that the evil ones pretending to be you?
They’re telling me to do it, Martha. I hear your voice, telling me to do it! I think it’s them, Martha! But maybe it’s you! It sure sounds like you!
Okay, I’ll do it. I’ll do it all ready. I’ll do it.
I’ll be seeing you soon, Martha. Real soon!
Martha?
Narrator:
In the end, the nameless, homeless, man left his pen-pal letter on Martha’s grave, staked down into the ground with the ballpoint pen stabbed through it. He then stood up from his kneeling position. He formed the sign 0f the cross on his body. Whisperimg, he said, “I’m sorry, Lord!” A tear fell down his cheek, his chin quivered, and then he reached into his belt, and pulled out the revolver. “Please forgive me, Lord. The evil ones are making me do this. I beg of You to have mercy on my soul.” and finally, the man stuck the gun into his mouth and pulled the trigger. His body fell limp onto Martha’s grave. His blood seeped into the soil of his caretaker’s resting place. He wrote a final letter to Martha, his long-time pen pal above and beyond, and then he went to join her.
No one knew who the homeless man was. He was buried in a cheap pine box in the far corner of the cemetery. A wooden cross was erected for a makeshift grave marker and a name board hangs from it with these words inscribed on to it: “The Pen Pal”.
Legend has it that on certain occassions, especially near dusk, an old woman’s voice can be heard speaking near The Pen Pal’s grave.
Wrap it up with a video CCR I heard it through the grapevine.
I heard it through the grapevine lyrics link to one.
