{"id":339,"date":"2024-11-20T22:27:44","date_gmt":"2024-11-20T22:27:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/20-1\/?page_id=339"},"modified":"2024-11-30T03:30:20","modified_gmt":"2024-11-30T03:30:20","slug":"scorned-magdalena","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/20-1\/scorned-magdalena\/","title":{"rendered":"Scorned Magdalena"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Somoshree Palit<\/span><\/p>\n

God, let’s be children again.<\/span><\/p>\n

A moment of scorn, a moment of joy :<\/span><\/p>\n

Let’s stroll in the garden in bouts of rain<\/span><\/p>\n

For today, become a carpenter’s boy.<\/span><\/p>\n

For today, let us forget the pain \u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

I’ll pluck some orchids for your hair,<\/span><\/p>\n

I’ll forget my hands have the mark of Cain<\/span><\/p>\n

We’ll smell Eden upon the desert air.<\/span><\/p>\n

God, let’s be children, you see<\/span><\/p>\n

I’ll chase you round, if you’ll chase me.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

God, let’s be children once more.<\/span><\/p>\n

You’ll close your eyes and count to ten;<\/span><\/p>\n

You’ll find the sleeve of the shirt I wore<\/span><\/p>\n

We’ll laugh together, hidden from men.<\/span><\/p>\n

And if you couldn’t, you’d call my name,<\/span><\/p>\n

And I would ache for your return \u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

For what is Desire in a defeated game?<\/span><\/p>\n

How shall I win when I am bound to turn?<\/span><\/p>\n

Why find your church in the streets of Rome?<\/span><\/p>\n

Hold my jaws. Dream of home.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

God, let’s be children, I plead.<\/span><\/p>\n

I’ll tell you a story as you hold my hand.<\/span><\/p>\n

I’ll tell you, how love, you are my creed,<\/span><\/p>\n

My crusade, my burial, my Promised Land.<\/span><\/p>\n

As I sculpt pagan gods sit by me,<\/span><\/p>\n

Teach me how you made a dog<\/span><\/p>\n

With the same hands that you sculpted the sea,<\/span><\/p>\n

Take out my speck, I’ll take out your log.<\/span><\/p>\n

Carpenter’s boy, with the cross in Rome,<\/span><\/p>\n

Did you smell the wood, and think of home?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

God, let’s be children, I swear<\/span><\/p>\n

I’ll love you better but I can’t love you more.<\/span><\/p>\n

This time around I’ll learn to wear<\/span><\/p>\n

Your jaws on my crown and crawl on four.<\/span><\/p>\n

Where is my home where I belong \u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

Where is my first born anguished bleat?<\/span><\/p>\n

Where is my epitaph, my softest song?<\/span><\/p>\n

Where is your throat? Where are your feet?<\/span><\/p>\n

Were you hurt when you held me by the horn,<\/span><\/p>\n

The last born child of a first born scorn?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

God, let’s be children, pray tell \u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

If Omnipotence works like a game of dice.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now you’d be all, now you’d be none,<\/span><\/p>\n

Now you’d be a god that was crucified twice.<\/span><\/p>\n

They name you Rabbi \u2014 to name you ‘Mine’<\/span><\/p>\n

I’d chew on the canines I fear to pet.<\/span><\/p>\n

I would eat your sins, be your wine,<\/span><\/p>\n

God make me holy \u2014 just, not yet.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

God, why can’t we be children again?<\/span><\/p>\n

Remember how our days were like?<\/span><\/p>\n

Now that you are a child of God,<\/span><\/p>\n

Your scorn and frolic look alike.<\/span><\/p>\n

Carpenter’s boy, Mary’s son,<\/span><\/p>\n

Did you feel like Atlas bearing your cross?<\/span><\/p>\n

Rabid dog, my light of the Sun,<\/span><\/p>\n

How shall I name this grief of your loss?<\/span><\/p>\n

A martyred Lamb.<\/span><\/p>\n

A martyred Son<\/span><\/p>\n

A fallen bride.<\/span><\/p>\n

And God undone.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

God, why won’t you be a child for me?<\/span><\/p>\n

You seem so far away \u2014 who moved?<\/span><\/p>\n

I’d like to become a god and see<\/span><\/p>\n

Broken spines and remain unmoved.<\/span><\/p>\n

What submission had licked the ocean floor<\/span><\/p>\n

That she parted in two for Moses’ staff?<\/span><\/p>\n

If you had held my mouth and said no more<\/span><\/p>\n

I’d have parted myself for a chance of your laugh.<\/span><\/p>\n

Your act of god was rising to the skies.<\/span><\/p>\n

My act of devotion was kissing your thighs.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

God, where you had been born a child,<\/span><\/p>\n

Where dark cathedral carols were sung,<\/span><\/p>\n

Had you flinched at the sight of a twitching dog<\/span><\/p>\n

I would be the meat to palate your tongue.<\/span><\/p>\n

Let us leave for snow-capped peaks in the South,<\/span><\/p>\n

A novel Trinity with the Harlot and Son,<\/span><\/p>\n

And the Holy Spirit like froth in my mouth \u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

A Christ for all and a Christ for none.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

You said Love thine enemies so they maybe few :<\/span><\/p>\n

Like a dog I obeyed. I loved you.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

So when you become a child again<\/span><\/p>\n

Read your Bible upon my intestine.<\/span><\/p>\n

Your nails in my gut won’t give me pain,<\/span><\/p>\n

I’ll wear a girdle of your ivory spine.<\/span><\/p>\n

I’ll hold your phalanges between my lips<\/span><\/p>\n

And call them cigars. Futile. Divine.<\/span><\/p>\n

On your sacrum would be my acrylic paint<\/span><\/p>\n

Pthalo, and lime \u2014 I’ll paint a vine.<\/span><\/p>\n

They’ll take my carpus and my corpse<\/span><\/p>\n

And read sermons to me beside your shrine,<\/span><\/p>\n

For all your psalms you cannot cease<\/span><\/p>\n

This divine alchemy of the semi-divine.<\/span><\/p>\n

Each vertebrae would count to seven,<\/span><\/p>\n

The femurs I’ll keep for me to dine.<\/span><\/p>\n

I’ll make a chalice of your parietal lobe<\/span><\/p>\n

I’ll drink and know your holy design.<\/span><\/p>\n

I’ll kneel as a devotee before you God,<\/span><\/p>\n

Like a vulture, I’ll pronounce you mine \u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I’ll make rosaries out of your pearly teeth<\/span><\/p>\n

And gulp them down with wine.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Somoshree Palit God, let’s be children again. A moment of scorn, a moment of joy : Let’s stroll in the garden in bouts of rain For today, become a carpenter’s boy. For today, let us forget the pain \u2014 I’ll pluck some orchids for your hair, I’ll forget my hands have the mark of Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":81,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":55,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-339","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/20-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/339","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/20-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/20-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/20-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/81"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/20-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=339"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/20-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/339\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":340,"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/20-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/339\/revisions\/340"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/20-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=339"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}