Summon up the long lost legions
it is the latter days and nights
pitched deep, starless as Hade's nether crack
a sweat of desperation in air gone sour
hard to breathe
Dante's bark is ditched on a mud-bank
his footsteps fill with pond slime
iridescent as the scaly hides of fish
The river's still, thick as pudding
we wait and fill our time with chants
text messages sent by urban tribesmen
from a time that land forgot.
Look out the window of the 4th street bus
see your sad reflection. The scar that never
went away scores your cheek
a Prussian foil's cut, but was in fact
a cat that you surprised, tried to gather up
when you were five. Mary do you see
the light at the end of the tunnel? Has your
fine body coarsened over all these years.
What are you holding in your lap that
means so much. Can you make the change?
Your stop is just ahead, tokens not accepted
Via Dolorosa, Jesus' halting footsteps
through narrow streets, hauling that load
on bony shoulders. Tears spurt like geysers
from the open windows of double wides
country songs your mother sang
recall memories of great celebrity
Listen, is all they can do, the welfare moms,
the arthritic pensioners, the food stamp kids
Crucifixion is no small thing. But is it Death
or Resurrection that you fear?
Children, mindless, grinning brats,
throw angled rocks and twisting cats
browbeaten by their football dads
desperate for love of any kind
If only Papa could have played
bonus babies signed for megabucks
a night on Letterman, a fleet of Mercedes
more pussy than they ever dreamed!
But the coaches never understood
never saw fame in their fat beer bellies
They take it out on whining wives
send the kids to concentration camps.
The procession crawls by old screen doors
past faded flamingos on the lawns
up the hill past the brewery
where other crosses tilt and sway
occupied by petty crooks and false Evangelists
leaning in the Jerusalem wind
It will all come right. The sun will shine
The clouds will have their silver linings
a pound of flesh the contract signed
Don't look a gift horse in the mouth
Eat drink and do Mary
So simple
after all
.
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