Saint Peter   I saw Saint Peter, like in a cartoon, enrobed beside the pearly gates. I fell to my knees, duly thunderstruck. The bronze-   bound ledger, the feather pen — all of it. A thief stepped up and Peter waved him through, never batting an eye at what was written   in the book. Then I won’t go to hell either, I thought, striding toward the God-lit gate. Peter sighed. “You were doing so well.”     © Michael Fleming Dummerston, Vermont June 2025