Did you hear?
The preacher met the mendicant who’s
proselytizing the end of the world Saturday.
They sat and had it out
on the steps in front of the old
  Baptist church on Main St., each idolizing
their poison with the wild green
all around, the preacher high
   on the holy steps
looking so divine above
the hobo in multicolored rags,
who scams and scams the plentiful
   from a gutter-pipe and who began
the conversation like this:

[snort]: “Go on father! Out with it,
what’d you call me out here for?”

“I hear you’re preaching the end of the world, Charlie—”
     he said putting a stick of gum to his lips,
     suddenly conscious of his stinking breath.
“Well, you’re scaring some of the lambs from my flock, they’re
       frightened beyond their wits—and I’m sorry but this is outrageous
I demand to know why, exactly why!
Because it’s interfering with my plans,
for Saturday I am preaching the End of Times.”

“Well… I believe it for a number of reasons,” said
  the hobo shouldering his heavy sign of doom.
“I mean things just keep getting worse,
no one gives to the needy anymore,
the poor are many, the golden skyscrapers high,
                            those huddling in the streets from gloom
     are praying to die—not to be saved,
   and their numbers just keep growing—
    the most double blessing that a
    man can get used to anything….
So I thought why not take advantage of my situation—
      I gotta make a meal!—
so I blew the crooked horn and said
that all ye minutemen of sin
                   and tradition are just killing
by rules that no one believes in….”
      
        Just then a fat green fly went buzzing by,
reminding Charlie of an old poem
“But tell me father, why do you
      believe in the End of
Times…?”

And the preacher in his dress took a deep sigh
wondering why it was everything had to die by Saturday:
“Well…. there are a number of signs.
         But mostly I think it’s morals—
nobody has any respect
    anymore, they open up
your door for you and say:
‘Excuse you!
        That’ll be five dollars.’
    How freewill
             turns and twists minds.
The youthful
          free, starving wanting-to-be artists—
       they won’t tithe in my church anymore,
they just throw me their books and say
with a blithe look that it’s not about
money anymore…
But what are they saying?
         Meanwhile they put a ****** hex
on all that is holy, have ***
     on all that’s white and pure.
Say that I’m an old man
            in a dress and that we’re all
blessed when really
     none of us are blessed—
say that the light is muddy
and the dark is clear, when really
I’m as clean as I can be, no foul
    smelling intentions in me!
         And that is how the End of Times will be!”

  And before the stench of death
could escape his breath, he put another
stick of gum to his lips.
  
   “Agreed.” said the hobo hastily….
     “But father, it doesn’t seem like
our lambs are really that different,
    it seems more to me that we’ve
been shepherding from the same flock
    and what we ought to do is take advantage
             of this unique situation.
                 Let’s put up a big round shining tent
                       on Main St. for Saturday
   and we’ll hold a dual End of Times—
       our lambs together, don’t you see?
      We’ll draw in twice the crowd
        twice the lot
twice the loud, crying fervor
believing in the burning streets.”
  
“Yes….. yes!” said the preacher with a corvine grin
and a turning coin in his eyes.
      “I get what you’re saying now. Yes, it’s genius—our preaching
together, one way or another, we’ll rake it in—and after the ending,
      when it’s all through….
Uh… [ahem] tell me, just one more thing—you do believe in the End of Times?”

“Sure, brother, sure…
        don’t you?”