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This writing was accepted for publication in the 84 page perfect-bound issue of cc&d (v226) (the November 2011 Issue, You can also order this 5.5" x 8.5" issue as an ISSN# paperback book:						This is also in this 6" x 9" ISBN# paperback “No Return” Order this 6" x 9" ISBN# book:

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Virgins

Gale Acuff

I know where the dead go, I mean, when they
die. I raise my hand in Miss Hooker’s class
here at Sunday School and she calls on me
to share what I know. If they’re good, I say,
I mean if they’ve been good, they get Heaven,
I mean they get to go there and live with
God and Jesus and the Holy Ghost and
all the people in the Bible, the good
people, I mean, and the disciples, well,
probably not Judas but who am I
to judge, and Mary. And Paul. And others.
That’s a good answer, Miss Hooker says. And
suppose they’ve been bad and sinned and never
asked for forgiveness? I still have my hand

up, I don’t know why, I couldn’t feel my
arm and maybe that’s how an angel feels
so there’s hope for me, too. They go to Hell,
I say, the Bad Place, where they get punished
and I guess it’s too late for them to see
the light, or only the light of flames. There,

I’m a poet and not just a preacher
and I feel proud but pride’s a sin so I
try to be modest and Miss Hooker can
tell that I don’t mean to put on airs and
I hope God can, too, I’m not trying to
fool Him because you can’t, you can only
fool yourself. That’s why it’s called religion,
I guess. Miss Hooker says we never know
when God might call us to Eternity
and what that means is that God will get us

at any time, even when our time’s not
up, if that makes any sense. Hell, I’m just
ten years old and she’s 25, maybe,
and been to college or at least vo-tech,
they’re kind of the same thing, so she should know
her stuff, God trusts her to teach it to us
or at least the deacons do, whoever
they are. Maybe they’re like disciples and

if so then they’re not perfect so how can God
say—I mean Jesus, or maybe They’re both
the same, I still don’t quite get that—Be ye
therefore perfect to a ten-year-old kid,
not that I was around in the old
time but I can read and listen even
better and I’m pretty sure He said that
though not in English of course but then if
God is God He can say whatever He
wants and in any old language at all
though sometimes I wonder which one He speaks
or likes best or if He only uses
telepathy because it saves time or
I guess it would save time, I can always ask

Miss Hooker after class. Last Sunday I
stayed behind to help her stack the hymnals
and was working up the courage to ask
her what a virgin is, I heard the word
from a buddy in regular school and
I know about the Virgin Mary but
she had a baby so how could she be
a virgin, too? It’s got something to do
with girls before they’re women, I guess, and
I’m a boy so maybe it’s none of my
business and I prayed for an answer from
God that night and the next thing I knew it

was Sunday morning and time for our class.
But when I walked Miss Hooker to her car
and said, I’ve got a puzzler for you, she
said, Okay, Gale, how can I help you, my
mouth wouldn’t ask the question though my mind
did but then she couldn’t hear that, if it
was my mind and not my heart or soul if
they’re not all the same, like the Trinity.
Finally I said, Never mind, but I
must’ve looked troubled or my heart was and
showed it through my face and my eyes looking

down at Miss Hooker’s open-toe shoes and
her painted toenails, purple they were or
is it violet or even lavender
so she reached out for me, put a finger
underneath my chin and brought it up and
said, What’s the matter, Gale, tell Miss Hooker,
and all I could say was I sure love you
a lot and I wish you’d marry me, which
isn’t what I wanted to say, or was,
who really knows? If I do I wish I’d
tell me. Then she leaned toward me and I

could see the tops of her chests and that place
where they start to separate and I thought
If men can be virgins, too, I’m not one
now, a virgin I mean, not a man, not
that I’m a man, of course, but I’m on track
to being one unless God snuffs me out,
say on the way home from Sunday School and
maybe pushes me into traffic, I
walk to church and back again, of course, for
seeing something I’m not supposed to see,
like the Ark of the Covenant but in

Miss Hooker. Then she said, I love you, too,
and when you’re a man, if I’m still single
maybe we can go out on a date. Oh,
I said, with my eyes shut, Yes ma’am, thank you.
Then she got in her car and drove away
and I just stood and watched ‘til she was gone
completely. So you’re a virgin if you’re
single, so I’m still one and so is she
but does God have a wife? He’s a virgin,
too, I guess. And what about people who
get divorced, do they get their virgin back?
I’d ask Mother or Father but they’re not
much help—they don’t even know where babies
come from and they had me so no wonder
they tell me to wait until I’m older.
I guess that when I’m dead I’ll know it all,

which seems a lot to ask of me to learn
everything, but then I didn’t make
the world, I just live in it and most of
the time happily, I think. If I go
to Hell I’ll know what’s what and the same for
Heaven and the difference seems to be
you’re forgiven for what you know, I mean
in Heaven, and as for Hell you can’t know
too much. So I’d better be damn careful
from now on, I don’t want to die and die

again, I want to die and get life right
even if I’m an angel and besides,
Miss Hooker will make it to the Good Place
for sure. And then I’ll ask her my question.

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