I use ‘oh, my god’ as an expression
not of faith, but surprise,
of wonder at beauty untouched
by ideology or dogma
as if caught, and pulled, from a dream.

I exclaim ‘oh, my god’ when stunned
not by holy ghosts, but the living,
who do kindness  as though it were nothing
unmindful of securing safe passage
into heaven, or paradise.

‘Oh, my god’, I cry, when words fall idle
or are muted to quiet reverence.
Where twisted skeins of empiric memory,
rush in crashing surf
of reminiscence and nostalgia.

I am godless, but not without reason
‘oh, my god’ being a slip of historical,
idiomatic vernacular.
Even as curiosity drives me to understand
your own ritualistic, devotional motivations.

Raise the cup, my friend
it gives us both what we need.
For you, transubstantiation
for me a divine and luscious tableaux.
For Saint Teresa in her ecstasy no doubt exclaimed
‘Oh, my god’!

If wishes were prayer

Saturday, January 28, 2023
12:06 PM

let me go wry or right, let me
be as one you witnessed falling,

and for that breath, believed,
wishes work as wonders do,
with very little help from things
thought truer.

I think of you, reading words I write,
I thrill a little at the intimate point of wedom,
the thoughts I fit to words, and sent into the
other
state, to wait, and wait, and become too tiny
to make any change not made,

at the time, when we touched as words do,
and held the hope that words hold.

Being as an event, we be apart, we be all one.

And we cannot unbecome.
----------------------

Inner being, being in me, other than I,
guide me, today.

I am willing to be useful, I do not have an aim,
I hold no hope of fame and recognosis,
I live to become a memory, at best,
and less than a memory, eventually.

I lie if I deny the joy I take from any sign, I see
you, thinking whys atop wherefores and how comes,

sudden otherness
occuring in a wedom framed by grand imaginations,

a new form of governing mankind, a new reason
to be defensive…

earnestly contending for pride of place, top of the pile.
------------------------

My Saturday, as all my days are now,
a day of rest,
a day of being after growing old enough, not, too;
but plenty old enough,
to reason with war,
face on face, as if, war
and I were forces of the same sort.

Ideas, grand wads of thought threads, spun
from times last chances,
grabbed with all I have to hold, huggishly,
for comforting knowledge,

I am not alone in wishing prayers were left being,
answered on reception, now, then, left being
alright. Amen.
-----------

It is in the thousands, tens of thousands, even,
Even, everish, same old, same
balanced on the upright,
walking,
past any hope to become one of those, the greats,

not even a billion to one, the odds of me becoming,
by the time I survived, the odds were even worse,
not a chance.

I bet, I said, I bet I won,
my race already run, by now, you know,
the results are pending
review,
and then I died,
and the results were these remaining
lines you take in,
as though you heard me talking, and thought
you might
over hear and know, all the songs of us, are about you.

The most self-centered man I ever met, said
my therapist to me, as I spun dervishly on my point.
------------------

Xenophiles see it all the time.

The transubstantiation of matter
causing hysteria among every culture.

One alchemical shift from lead to gold
and you have empaths weeping over asps,
telekinetics dropping things on fairy's heads.

A tiny fusion of atoms and the next thing you know
satyrs are dancing with dingos, sphinxes are doing the two step.

Who knows what the next time/space shift is going to bring?

Sigh...........makes for a long day at work.  Ya know?

alas, i've heard it asked: how can we
write poetry after Auschwitz?
i don't know. and prose? i don't know: gone mad
the whole world implodes and dips its dove's foot into my purple brow:
in a dream, ink erupts from under my dirt encrusted fingernails
and it is the transubstantiation of my rainbow stained blood,
and the void was flooded:
what's a word? more than i—more than i can show.
how did they write poetry after colonialism?
after other slaves and other genocides?
i don't know. Rimbaud traded in slaves, and, before his fury,
wrote masterpieces... perhaps its obvious; a bad pun, to help us cope,
—he even left the path to his divinity,
but all this has nothing to do with anything—.
perhaps every genocide needs its herald poets.
and the rest, how did they write? i don't know.
perhaps it was not their concern;
they desired to write, and there, they did not give way, and so
were right.
and is it the same with us, as we write
through the screams of the however many millions coming from Congo
and from however many other scenes similar? i—
perhaps i do not need to know,
perhaps, in fact, i cannot write poetry.
if i'm to try, it pertains to me to be of use in case this comes to a fight.

and life, if life is drama,
then there will always be roles:
there will always be the part of the villain that needs playing,
an immortal space to be filled by actor after actor,
we cannot stop them, we cannot stop them;
our enemy is a hydra's head!
the task, then, is to re-write the script!
ad lib won't cut it!
cast away your hope, boredom and wonder:
we'll need fire and a pen mightier than a golden sword,
and softly spoken words that can split history asunder.

The sun shines through the
      empty cross.
Stained glass windows
       making salvation patterns
           for the heart.
Christ shines in ever increasing
        flashes of magnificence.
Hail Mary! Your Son is our God!
   With Holy Trinity in union,
        with souls seeking peace.
The Son of Man, the Son of God
       revealed in ageless liturgy.
Hail Mary! Your Son has ascended.
Rosary glistening in hand,
      as prayers are offered
           in simple voice.
Chanting priest as conduit
        to the transubstantiation .
Hail Mary! The Body of Christ is ours!

NON SERVIAM

Even at 7
found Catholic transubstantiation

hard to swallow.

Much preferred the Protestant
metaphor better.

The priest exposing the host
in the monstrance

the congregation bowing
in veneration.

"Corpus Domini nostri..."

Now...holy cow
Jesus is leaping

from the tip of my tongue
Christ...clinging

to my palate hanging
on for dear life

before going to pieces
slipping down my...gulp

. . .oe... soph...a...gus .

". . .In vitam eternam. Amen."

The incense from the thurible
as it sways

making me feel so
si...aghhhhh...ck!

Me a little Lucifer
a lightbringer ...my own morning star.

Afraid I am
going to throw

Him up

the second coming
as I sit in my pew and stew

transubstantiation is
the pits.

they came
slurred and darkened
angry and
with a tinge of indigence  
let me see those clothes
i pointed to the pile
on the quilt that the ex made
dig through it
i murmured
and i sank
deep within myself
though 20's era deviants kept me
above the "sunk" place

on her side
completely silent
on mine raucous
but i can identify with donning
the drab of a different era
he said as he wrote
and looked at his phone

there is nothing about us static
nothing that keeps us from
killing ourselves only to be revived
in a brand new era
or moment of slight significance

i perform this act in times legion
dressing to impress
or to convey honest slovenliness
or power
or amorousness

this task
these efforts
can never be realized
attempting transubstantiation fails
and its motive with it

with jeans and a white tee
i am this one
lonely
lost
lingering
limitless

by all means
take all my clothes
ties and suspenders too
i have what im wearing