You are on a very long list
of those who can’t though they persist.

Learn the lesson of Achilles heel--
there's something that doesn't want you here.

You hold tightly the images of misguided faith,
role models and illusory joy;
but graven images topple
as slow as dry rot
and Pandora quietly fills
your box of toys.

Your house is projected and frozen in time.
Twenty layers of wallpaper are peeling your mind.
Rooms untouched like
100-year-old
Mason jar preserves;
you can't eat fruit kept for so many years.

Your choice of worlds kept the patterns;
no new beginnings mean the same old ends.
You may not break all the rules
but you sure make them bend.

Grace seemed to touch you as you walked a mile or two seemingly content.
But no matter how amazing
the grace was,
you can't be where you never went.

As long as scapegoats hang on crosses all
along this highway like rows
of pigs hanging bloodless
at the slaughterhouse
and as long as
Western religious pop culture icons
and other social images replace what is real,
the roadblocks and washouts
will continue to keep you there.

Achilles protected everything
but his heel.

www.firesermon.com
by Michael R. Burch

your gods have become e-vegetation;
your saints—pale thumbnail icons; to enlarge
their images, right-click; it isn’t hard
to populate your web-site; not to mention

cool sound effects are nice; Sound Blaster cards
can liven up dull sermons, [zing some fire];
your drives need added Zip; you must discard
your balky paternosters: ***!!! Desire!!!

these are the watchwords, catholic; you must
as Yahoo! did, employ a little lust :)
if you want great e-commerce; hire a bard
to spruce up ancient language, shed the dust

of centuries of sameness;
                                            lameness *****;
your gods grew blurred; go 3D; scale; adjust.

Published by Ironwood, Triplopia and Nisqually Delta Review. This poem pokes fun at several stages of "religion," all tied into Eliot's "Fire Sermon," albeit elliptically. (1) The Celts believed that the health of the land was tied to the health of its king. The Fisher King's land was in peril because he had an infirmity (lameness, infertility, it really didn't matter in those days). One bad harvest and it was the king's fault for displeasing the gods. A religious icon (the Grail) could somehow rescue him. Strange logic! (2) The next stage brings us the saints, the Catholic church, etc. Millions are slaughtered, tortured and enslaved in the name of religion. Strange logic! (3) The next stage brings us to Darwin, modernism and "The Waste Land.” Religion is dead. God is dead. Man is a glorified fungus! Long live Darwin! We'll evolve into something better adapted to life on Earth, someday (if we don’t destroy it first). But what do we have now, except a hangover? Strange logic! (4) The current stage of religion is perhaps summed up by this e-mail: the only way religion can compete today is as a form of flashy entertainment. ***** a website before it's too late!  Keywords/Tags: god, gods, religion, saints, icons, images, imagery, update, scale, adjust

You emoji’d me a happy face
I emoji’d you back a heart.
You sent me an okay thing.
When did all this start?

You shot me back an icon
That looked rather like a hand
But my phone’s screen is small
So I couldn’t quite understand.
I wan’t moving fast enough
To send an answer right back.
You sent another emoji and that
Was when I completely lost track.

I got from you a little thing
Like a jack’o’lantern face
So I sent a laughing icon
That must have been a disgrace.
You zapped back three letters
Which I quickly recognized.
W, T and F, in caps appeared
Like a specter before my eyes.

You emoji’d me a happy face
I emoji’d you back a heart.
You sent me an okay thing.
When did all this start?

I typed in a question mark
And quickly hit the ‘send’
Still hoping against hope
This madness could end
And we could begin to speak
As human beings can do
If they use the keyboard letters
And at least a finger or two.

I never heard from you again
I must have done something bad.
Not even a red face emoji
Or the one that means you’re sad.
I try to stay on top of things
As new fashions will unfold
But this kind of funny picture show
Quickly has gotten old.

You emoji’d me a happy face
I emoji’d you back a heart.
You sent me an okay thing.
When did all this start?

I have many koalifications,
Numbed by gum leaves, stupefaction,
Glazed by arid summer drought,
Real hot today, there's no doubt!
What's this? Black storm clouds?
Who said clouds were allowed?
Now there's rain a'drenching,
Oh, it's stopped, not worth mentioning,
There's a eucalyptus Petrichor,
I'll daze now, did it rain at all?