anonymous
Her ultimatum is
1. Isolate from the family I found
protective older brother with the softest eyes,
2. take a match to my last bridge
humble beams which lead to former lifelines
on nights not to be spent alone,
3. repent
or an infernus eternity.
Shuddering, I choose Her
strike match to box and turn a newly hardened shoulder
so I won’t see what I’m losing
as it warms my skin.
My lumber beams ablaze, the match burns to nothing
the last parts of me with it.
My crackling past embosses Her approval.
Love is gratification delayed
my worth, in Her, how well I destroy myself
how well the crown of my head holds the holy sheet of lace
like a veil could soak up each lie I’ve told,
each ingénue I’ve loved.
Folks say this is a warning sign
tell you to pack what you can’t afford to lose
flee into silent starlight, the only witnesses,
long gone celestial bodies who will deliver you to safety.
Tell you to kick and bite and scratch
and thrash.
Tell you.
Their words are honest as Judas
a fine display of virtue signaling
as they excuse Her in the next exhale.
She is seated at the right hand of the founding father
a table we are not allowed to sit at
a dinner party invitation never received
a lackluster promise
that all are welcome.
Her scripture lures lost heathens, like I
with newly hardened shoulders, smelling of smoke.
Offers dinner invitations for our compliance.
Like a glitz-eyed fool I accept!—
elated my people are placed
in Her good graces, say grace
with our chairs politely tucked in
so tight our ribs scrape the altar-cloth.
But dinner is not the meal we rsvped to.
The forefathers, saints, look the other way as
Her scalpel an incision cuts,
then
peels off our skin,
rubs
salt into our sin,
saving us.
The only audible words
heard over the red-hot tumult
are
frag ment s of pray er s.
The forefathers, saints, too raised
to see the salt-cured human meat we have become.
We choke wet heat, sweaty nausea and
inhumane groaning like a sacred slaughterhouse.
And no matter what we plead recite or burn
We are the advocatus diaboli,
lambs locusts testaments to Her lies,
Her abuse as an excuse for salvation.
No tabernacle teaches this!
What god pleasures themself to self-destruction?
Not one worth worshipping, not unconditionally,
not a god, but a finger-pointing parasite.
Divinity never belonged to her—
our hearts beat the same blood.
If a God will settle our scores, it is a god alone
and if he created a world he loved, it is one
where hearts beat as born,
not bleaching the rainbow monochrome
not settling because annulments are abysmal
not cursing your skin for holding you wrong
not disproving of chosen families when yours hurt you
and not dowsing the bridge that connects you to them.
I believe there is such a God out there.
We are not these things we’ve done. I do.
I don’t excuse myself,
push my ribs from the altar-cloth.
The dead stars keep my secrets like foreshadowing.
My family! sprinting, my shoulder resoftens
yet a stench of singed hair and burnt flesh
is coming from the other side of the exploding bridge
where they live, my family lived,
twists my brain like a
in my ash-tray lungs
tells me
and it’s my fault.
the world is still and spinning
as my veins sting, shriek like
my brother’s soft eyes melting out of his skull.
oh! God no I s
I
and I see what I’ve lost
as it warms my skin.