Crucifixes
CJ Leon

There was a crucifix above every door in Grandma's house,
and on a couple of walls top-centre otherwise barren.

She inherited that trick from generations of God-fearing home-owning Mr's
who kept the livelong day their singing house-keeping Mrs's
well-reminded of the plight of sons of men
and the world out of doors.

She decorated them with yellowing palm leaves
acquired one per year on Palm Sundays
at the Catholic service nearby.

She used to say that
'anytime you have the mind
is enough a time to pray; you could be
sweeping the kitchen floor or riding your bicycle, bored in class or climbing trees;
just turn to God and give.'

But voices turn to God purveying misery,
keeping their joys their own,
because the least likely guy
to be impressed by your jeweled sink taps
is one in the throes of execution,
compare lethal injection,
hanging, the rack, impalement, disembowelment,
exposure, starvation, and the electric chair;
and the least likely man to dance drunk
is the naked one publicly crucified
wearing a dunce crown
and a sign.

So, somewhere along the line,
I learned never to trust the man
at the end of the whip. Either one.
They're both preoccupied.

After a season of hunger, I glutted blue-rare
the Blood-Bodied Father and Son
and their ascetic bravado,
and I sucked
the fruit nectars of Lovers' Communion.

I learned to despise and war the misery of life,
not to glorify, not hope for deliverance from it in death.

It's pathological optimism,
or the poet in me,
but life is so much worthier;
Life manifests Christ
in its so many familiar faces,

Christ who is the resurrecting body,
the spirit of bread and wine and the urge,
Christ of miracles, of accomplished whores,
the good-loving Christ who always pulls rent
out of a fish's mouth or at least finds a place to crash
for a few days while the universe resolves the problem.

My Christ plays guitar, gets shit-faced,
gets laid, sings sauntering down the street,
brings strings of Christmas lights to her lovers because their living spaces seem lacking
a certain light these days.
My Christ knows the crackheads on her street
by name and jams with them
to mutual everywhere musical delight.
My Christ gives baked goods,
her poems, dead flowers
to perfect strangers
and makes them perfect friends.
My Christ gives licorice to the sore-throated,
treats her starved neighboring artists to sex
and breakfast with real maple syrup,
freezer jam, and unlimited coffee,
gets them stoned before noon,
and sends them home to their art,
because human spirits, Christ knows,
will not survive on omelettess and toast alone.