A Litany In Time Of Plague

The Parish of Aquitaine walked solemnly through the streets of his town, which now looked as if it were inhabited only by ghosts. Not a sound was to be heard nor a face to be seen, all doors and windows lay shut tight; not even hope could pass through those walls. And of course, more often than not, houses were branded with that terrible, huge red cross. As many as he saw, each one renewed the Parish’s shivers, as he thought of the people of his town being abandoned by his God.

As he moved up north towards the place of his assignment he passed through the estate of a noble. It was a wonderful, large house, with a small moat and even a large garden space. The Parish knew this man, he was perhaps the richest and most powerful man of Aquitaine, and he was even a close friend of the region’s Lords. As he walked next to the door the Parish shivered tenfold what he did before; the door was marked with a red cross. He continued walking, undeterred in his pace, but the Parish’s mind was certainly not at ease. How could this have happened? The man was wealthy, powerful, loved personally by the King! All this did not seem to matter, his house was now infected. “We are all equal under God…” though the Parish to himself, so as to comfort his troubled mind. He of course found this comfort to be both temporary and false. Why would God punish all indiscriminately?! Maybe it wasn’t power or money that mattered, perhaps it was a question of morals, maybe this was God’s punishment to humanity for having completely forgotten his laws… But no, he had known many a righteous man who had succumbed to the plague in the same humiliating manner as had many a loose woman and many a common thief.

He reentered the estates of the peasants and saw corpses upon corpses being thrown into a giant ditch by those doctors wearing that dreaded beak-shaped mask. Oh how they troubled him so those masks! Not only were they horrid and ungodly in appearance, but everywhere they went, there was death. He felt an ice cold chill go down his spine as one of them turned from his job to look at him. The silent, deadly mask was glued to the Parish for a few seconds that stretched for centuries and the doctor then resumed his work without uttering a word. Passing the ditch, the Parish saw the mangled corpses, many of them filled with those disgusting purple skin patches, surrounded by blood, vomit and pus. More and more bodies fell into the ditch bringing with them more blood, vomit and pus. It was frightening to think that ditch, that disgusting putrid mess with a smell so strong and rancid it reached for miles, had once been full of hopes and dreams.

The Parish made a point to close his eyes as he increased his pace and left that dreaded street. When he reopened them, he could still see only visions of the ditch, of the doctors in the bird-masks, and of those poor souls, forgotten by God. In that ditch men lost their identity, they became only objects. He who had once been rich was in there with he who had once been poor, and he who had once been a good-hearted lover of God was in there with he who had once been the filthiest of sinners. “We are all equal under God…” though the Parish to himself. This time, he didn’t even bother being temporarily comforted by his empty words.

Finally he reached the house he had been assigned. It was the house of a poor peasant, Pierre Lunel de Montech, who had lost his five children to the plague, and had begged him to say one last prayer for them. He entered the house and immediately felt the weight of disease.
“You came!” shouted the de Montech in ecstasy, “Oh thank you so much Parish! I know you are a busy man, and I am eternally grateful for your visit!”
“Worry not my child” answered the Parish attempting to seem calm and collected, “it is my duty to aid you as a servant of God”.
Montech was horrid in appearance. He looked sick and tired, his eyes were bulged and red, as if he hadn’t slept for days because he was too busy crying. Yet he seemed revived by the Parish’s visit.

The poor farmer took him over to the place he had piled his children. Four girls and one boy, all dead and rotting, one of them covered in those repulsive purple skin stains. Pierre Lunel de Montech immediately burst into tears at the sight of his children. He fell on his knees and began sobbing uncontrollably, occasionally releasing loud piercing shrieks that struck the Parish’s soul. He had never seen a grown man cry in such a manner, with such desolation, with such hopelessness, with such incredible rage.

He knelt beside the corpses and began his prayer. It was of course in Latin, and the poor farmer, who barely spoke French, could not have possibly understood it. Yet as soon as it began his eyes lit up with hope, the thought of his little angels going to heaven somehow made it all a little more bearable. The Parish saw this hope and felt both pity and envy for the poor man. He now knew this hope to be false, yet it was the only comfort the man would receive during the rest of his life. If not as a servant of the God who’d forgotten them, then at least as a person it was his duty to help relieve this man of his pain as much as he could. And so he continued the prayer as the farmer’s tears of sadness turned into those of bittersweet joy.

“It is not under God we are all equal” though the Parish to himself as he continued the prayer, “it is under death we are all the same”.