Papier Mache Prayers

A Story for All Ages by Aaron McEmrys

There once was a land called “Logitopia.” It was a strange and very quiet place. You see, the people there believed only in those things that are proveable, touchable and verifiable, and so they made great scientists, but terrible poets.

Each Logitopian was taught from the very beginning that dreams are only illusions, hopes and fears mere distractions and that “vision” is just another word for “fantasy.” Even feelings like gratitude were brushed aside with a sneer – after all, what can gratitude buy or build? How can it be measured or parceled and put to good use?

But people are people of course, and stuffing away so many hopes and dreams is easier said than done, for these things – the need to imagine life as it could be or should be, the need to love, to thank, to bless – these things grow up in us like wildflowers after the rain, a wild explosion that we cannot control, much less stamp out.

So the people of Logitopia lived their lives with all their dreams stuffed down way deep inside. But sooner or later their bodies filled up with all their unspoken blessings until it felt as if there were a flock of birds or butterflies inside clamoring to get out! The storm of feelings would build until people walked everywhere with their hands over their mouths like this to keep all those irrational feelings from escaping!

Finally they built an enormous, hollow papier mache statue of a person, twenty feet high. They decorated her with beautiful flowers and colorful designs and it was by far the loveliest thing in the whole land.

The statue had slots, like mail slots all over it and whenever anyone felt an upwelling of illogical feeling coming over them they would go to the statue, lean up close, foreheads pressed against the stiff warm paper and whisper into the slots as if to a dear friend.

Other people wrote their feelings down on pieces of paper and slipped them silently through the slots, where they slowly filled up the statue from top to bottom:

“Last night I dreamed of a flying train. I was flying too, on the back of a huge metal grasshopper.”

“Thank you, my husband, for such a beautiful life.”

“I hope when I grow up there won’t be any wars anymore.”

“I hope she loves me. I hope she will say yes. Oh, I hope she’ll say yes!”

“The sky was so blue this morning against the green grass and the blue sea – a thousand thank yous for wherever such a perfect day came from!”

“Dear baby, may you grow up healthy and strong. May your cough go away. May you never go hungry and always know love.”

Over the years the whispers and blessings and hopes and dreams grew thick and wild inside the great statue until a very strange thing started to happen.

Tiny cracks began to appear in the statue’s thick paper body, exactly like the fine cracks on an eggshell just before a baby bird breaks free. The cracks grew and spread until they ran from the top of the statue to the bottom, and occasionally the people, who gathered around in wonder and confusion, thought they saw a flash of colorful movement flicker just under the surface.

And then, as the scientists in their white lab coats looked at one another and shrugged helplessly and the children and old people watched with unreadable expressions of yearning – the great statue burst apart in a snowfall of papier mache and flowing, bursting color as all the wishes, dreams and unexpressed love and longing took flight, each whisper and note transformed into so many hundreds, thousands – of brightly colored birdlike flags that fluttered and darted and flowed in the spring wind like a flock of a thousand kites.

The scraps of colorful, inexpressibly beautiful living paper were everywhere in the air, landing on felt hats and baby strollers and onto palms outstretched in surprise. And there they sat flapping their wings like fragile butterflies, each wingbeat in perfect time with a human heart.

And so it was that the people of Logitopia (which has since been renamed) were re-united with their dreams, their hopes, with everything that made them complete and whole - with everything that made life worth living.

As the sun lay it’s flaming head down over the waving sea, the people gathered up their prayers and remembered what it feels like to be blessed.