Fencing Bear at Prayer

By KC of the Dragon Common Room Competing groups were seen on Thomas Street, arrayed in festive and archaic clothes, and following behind with marching feet their acolytes on Eve of All Hallows.’ The first group chanted solemnly, downbeat. The next cackled with laughter like some crows. One warned that fêting evil leads to death; the next dismissed that as a shibboleth. The mournful melody of mindful monks kept chanting with the rhythm of their steps, unmoved by drunken men acting like punks, who were, de facto, Satan’s intercepts. “The people,” so they thought, “had simply drunk from deep within the well of modern texts.” Continuing their march, they were unfazed, and prayed as if it were the End of Days. For their part, all those old marauding boys kept right on laughing, drinking, having fun, and singing songs and making lots of noise. They acted like some battle had been won! “Just look,” they said, “at all of those killjoys! You’d think the Father never sent the Son!” And with tha...