Let There Be a Mustard Seed of Faith

Emile wore peculiar tattoos on both his arms
like a survivor of Auschwitz he carried his reminder of death
breathing on the pores of his skin were the sins of what they had done

with his ghost syringe still fixed in a familiar grip
I poked him zig zag
to wash the stains of what they had done
I wanted to comfort his tormented veins
but Emile was religious about suffering
wanting to make a peace that didn’t exist
like the false prophets he said, “peace, peace,
when there was no peace"

yet he always had the hope of Michael blowing
the golden trumpet he couldn’t touch
he had visions of carrying the falling plagues on his back
I couldn’t understand his obsession with eschaetology
but he knew that the trumpets of archangels were like acid
in the hands of men

We laughed when the walls of Jericho fell
celebrating with the nation of Israel and
we sighed at the mercy of God
sparing Rahab and her family

But Emile was a miserable man
hiding his bible underneath his field jacket
during those long campaigns in the Ukraine he grew lonely
still he wouldn’t let me underneath his skin
his homosexuality traveled deep

there were the affairs
the guilt, the penance,
the dark confessions behind
the illuminated screen and the
silhoutte of the priest with his
double chin
a vicarious participant

there was always me waiting beside his polished boots
waiting for him to be Matthew and leave his tax collecting
behind, there was always him wanting to join the thief on the cross
to hear Jesus say, “this day you will be with me in paradise.”
like a fanatic he believed in the stigmatas and in the apparitions of Mary in Fatima
I said I did not, but respected his right to worship

we sat in pews disguised as the gypsies he executed
sinners with arms too heavy to lift the dagger stares wounded us
praise barely a dying whisper upon our lips
our faith a glass ship tossed in a storm
waiting for the apparition of Jesus to float to us
Thomas was our patron saint digging into Christ’s flesh for
proof

we wanted to be the chicks in the brood Jesus wanted to protect
just hatched under the wings of its mother
he and I were fetuses waiting to be born
the rugged disciples under the translucent
skin of Christ preaching and healing the demon-possessed

we are great flashes of bright light illuminating the millions of miles
of naked universe,
the countless black holes that had swallowed suns whole
we were time travelers, traveling to find Christ
we flew on the thighs of angels
often he said he saw the golden sashed messanger Gabriel
kneeling before the throne of God
and he traveled his wind floating on his glorious
mane of blond

our faces searched for truth
until the pages in our bibles
started falling from the spines
and the edges curled and the verses
were all marked until we could no longer
read them, and the prayers we made never
seemed to change us
we crawled and bled mucous like beggars on the carpet
staying until we felt God over the words we desperately
wanted blessed

but our sins always kept us from pursuing God,
and our friendships with other people became more

in dreams Emile ministered to Daniel when he fasted
he says he knew the angel detained for weeks
we always strained our puny bodies
to hear a whisper from the lips of God
himself
I always told him that God is a quiet voice
within, ask Elijah living in a cave as a hermit
licking moisture from its walls to survive

and we wanted to serve with Joshua,
but attempting to pray is hard when the very skin
you wear crawls away a serpent with its own desires
like Eve, obeying the bellywalker needing the armpit
of Adam to shelter me, and I stood there naked with a man
I loved too!

Driven out of paradise the angel Emile recognized as Gabriel
held fire in his grip
to keep the human beings from never dying
they all took their turns becoming a heap of ashes,
Adam, then Eve and Abel and Cain and Seth,everyone
who passed the womb sealed with a curse

Emile saw its prophecy fulfilled and he wept
for more than the end of the world,
taking communion with Romanian survivors
hiding the insignias under the mantle of a peasant’s
old cape
put around his shoulders by a toothless old gypsy
whose daughter the Einzantzgruppen had just
murdered
his blue eyes bearing both the burden and the joy
of forgiveness

Emile was quiet hidden by a polite demeanor
every now and then the insatiate in his heart
demanded to be heard
he fed it drugs to numb the offender he had become

I was his friend not to be alone
even in the hole, the dirty bunk in the corner
he smuggled me pieces of bread
“I won’t abandon you”, he always said
a commiseration only we shared
and if it was love it wasn’t the kind that
stabbed and poked
his body had no sharp edges
still I screamed clawing my skin to get out
he taught me to scream like a gentleman
abuse yourself in the closet like the monks
so we mourned with our anger
with all the rage turned inward
we tried to turn out

he mourned his uniform,
and the sins of murder,
and he didn’t have enough
tears to fill the mass unmarked
graves he helped create

he found no reconciliation
with the bible and his body,
the more he found contradiction
in himself,
he found momentary freedom
from celibacy,
and praise,

“Until you find truth in the Word.” the old Romanian told him
then your praise will turned to celebration

I had mourned with promiscuity
we wore our sins as badges
wearing them to dishonor the souls beneath
wearing them until it scratched out its pain on our flesh
and theirs the indignity razors and needles
can’t scrub off, and we’ve showered with death
culpability doesn’t wash off easily

still I want to love my Saviour
who was a controversial Jew
let there be a mustard seed of faith
underneath this controversy of living

copyright2009misfit1965

(not my image)