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The sermon for Jun. 05, 2003 is: my last note about Natalia Wilson 12:01 a.m. For years, for years, I've been trying to write about Natalia Wilson; she was a pregnant 22-year-old girl I met in the hospital the first time I attempted suicide; I had met her at a most impressionable time. She was a runaway and schizophrenic, not unlike Dostoevsky in Siberia but far prettier; and because she was so pregnant, she couldn't take her Haldol and Thorazine and the other anti-psychotics that kept her in check; that, combined with the hormones unleashed in her system by her pregnancy, made her a most interesting person indeed. Of course I fell in love with her; she was unearthly, in psychosis and pregnancy; and undoubtedly only the weight of her extremely globular tummy kept her from levitating above our heads. For years I've been trying to write about her, the poems we exchanged in secret during group session, or the times when we would hide in a corner of the ward and whisper to one another. I've been trying to write of one afternoon in particular; but its memory and poetry is still too close to me for me to try to capture and corrupt it in words. But recently I've been made too aware of the frailty of my body, of the limitations of this vessel wherein I cache my keepsakes and souveniers. Soon I will lose everything. So I must tell you this story, beloved, and even if you think it oversentimental, take it anyway, and keep it somewhere, so that Natalia Wilson and I survive; or, if not survive, at least endure. It's a simple story. One afternoon Natalia and I were sitting by the piano in the recreation room, and I had just written a poem about sunlight and the hospital's barred windows and dying. You know, typical teenager stuff. And Natalia, just like Dostoevsky in Siberia, started talking about god. How god is everywhere, vibrating in the bloodstream like a low hum, so familiar and involved in everylittlething so much that escapes scrutiny. And I mocked her, you know, typical teenager stuff. And Natalia smiled and said, "I can prove it to you. Do you want to listen to god singing?" "Sure, sure," I said. This was a long time ago, so I had no suspicions at all that god singing would sound like Alannis Morissette, not unlike today. Natalia, smiling, reached out and took my big globular head in her hands; she pulled me close to her, to her breasts, so I could hear her heartbeat. "Cool," I said. "God plays the drums. Original!" "No," Natalia murmured, "no, listen. Hear." She moved; she rolled beneath my ear, I travelled the length of her, she pressed me to her swelling abdomen. "Here," she said. "Can you hear?" "How do I adjust reception on this thing? Is there an antenna?" "Shhh," Natalia said. "Close your eyes." I closed my eyes. Softly, Natalia started to sing,
I opened my eyes, and the sunlight seemed so bright, and Natalia so beautiful. I said, "God sings Beatles songs?" And that's all. That's all. I've been trying to write this for years, and perhaps soon I will hope that I will write this years from now, in a form that will better convey somehow just how Natalia saved my life that day, and how weirdly, eerily perfect that one Beatles song would be for god to sing. My last note about Natalia Wilson: after I was released, I called the hospital every day to talk with her. She gave birth, and they immediately put her on medication; her voice became slurred, its music obscured. One day she simply disappeared -- she had stopped taking her meds without notice, and one day walked through the locked doors without anyone noticing. So I hope you're out there, Natalia, wandering the roads and cities, perhaps with your daughter in tow, singing Beatles songs.
 
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