IF ONLY

Tags

Christian, poem, poem poetry political moral, satire

IF ONLY

if only could be as
cruel as God
they thought

watching the Passion
from afar

if only could be
sure as
a divine
robot

nail their colours
to that mast

absolute in
everything

no space
for doubt
or
heart

‪

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DAISY CHAIN

Tags

chain reaction, Christmas, Nuclear, poem, poetry, power, satire, thermonuclear

DAISY CHAIN

I never was much
for daisy chains

but, by the same token,
I never became
a nuclear physicist

those red-green chains you hang
at Christmas never
really turned my
spirit around

always had this
fear that the
Star of Bethlehem
would parachute down
land on my doorstep.

BEHOLD

Tags

Capitalism, Christianity, Jesus, poem, poem poetry political moral, poetry, satire, spiritual

BEHOLD!

cast that word “huddling”
out of your belief system

there is cruelty enough
even in the very incandescence of the stars

behold! there is so much fear:
bombarded with what ifs
big as space meteors
a crevasse has opened
if one should open
what would prevent
the Earth’s brutally hot
life-saving magma
to push its way from below
flow through the streets?

and so
let’s horror film jump-cut
to a whole new morality

based on
purity of gold, availability of paper,

as fire cleanses (in
that most
terrible of metaphors)

sweeps away those child-friendly images
of a saccharine-sweet Jesus
hugging and kissing as
if to restore
a lost humanity

restore what is due
(not speaking of pay)

LONG GOOD FRIDAY

Tags

Christian, death, Good Friday, meaning, poem, poetry

LONG GOOD FRIDAY

It was an extraordinarily long Good Friday
the sky had not yet begun to heal

schisms in the heart of men and all
their donominations and religions
plastered, but not yet scarred over
a trigle of renewed pressure and
they would assuredly
start to bleed

and no sacred cup this time round
to act as fount of magical forgiveness
nothing to affirm
the holy branding of this day and place
as special time of grace

just the wood of the crucifix, perhaps
planed into shape by one sharing
the peculiar craft as today’s chief victim
seasoned into shape by
the significance of this suffering

which, contrary to final statement,
agreed opinion may
not yet be over
still awaiting a kind
of completion

time for one hanging on the cross
never the same, never
to be the same.

ON YOUR BIRTHDAY

Tags

Heaven, Hell, hypocrisy, ironical, irony, Jesus, poem, poetry, writer, writing

ON YOUR BIRTHDAY

came over
all Santa
loving and giving
on your
birthday

and so
lost my chance to
sit with the unsaved
artists and
philosophers
chatting with
Shelley,Shakespeare
and Nietzsche

watching as the holier-than-thous
are ushered in
wondering at
what dark secret crimes,
what terrible hypocrisy
got them here
against their (skewed) expectations
as a writer relishing
exploring these
ironies-in-abundance

but I messed up, was
kind and generous (against
my true inclinations)
and now
I’m here

singing those stupid hymns
that they loved so much
(or indeed had
us believe they did)
those that
looking around

I do not see,
believe they must
be the exact same
sadly disappointed ones
in you, absolute and
total followers of
you

I will miss
for all
eternity, ones
I did refer to before

ON THE MORNING OF THE 41st DAY

Tags

Dionysus, divinity, Drama, Jesus, poem, poetry, spiritual, The Devil, wine

ON THE MORNING OF
THE 41st DAY

Rabbi
I see you sent
that evil one
packing

as if a
prophet like you
or a god like me
would worship
such as that
something so tacky,
brimstone-stinky, suffused
with unholy pride

not that you or I are free of this failing
each of us in our own way
making an adjustment

so, I’m here to chat
pitch for
peaceful co-existence

though I am (amongst other things)
god of wine
I regret I did not bring any
with me to enhance this occasion
(though as god of wine
it must have struck you
that I would have got to hear
of the miracle at the wedding
such a sublime, spontaneous transformation,
and what fine vintage — all
respect to you)

but I do have some bottled water
that they gave me on the plane
on my flight from the Greek mainland;
as for those Greeks, do
not believe all they have
written about me, about
my love of blood sacrifice, mass slaughter,
the tragedy of life and
other such drama

being like you
half
human born

set on a perpetual trajectory
of death and resurrection

such an admirer of your anger
in scattering the moneylenders
and what you just did
to that
hater of
mankind

calling himself a
“fallen angel”

for here we
share something deeper than
either of us, though divine, can ever
really fathom
our love for and bond
with mankind

a love, I must admit, not
identical in kind

yes, I see in your eyes, your
condemnation for my
disposing of Pentheus (that drooling, fooling-himself,
fatally repressed high-minded fascist)
but I was
simply giving that Caesar
what was due unto that Caesar

and what
is due unto you, I would offer
reverence if reverence were possible

nothing have I to give
but
the soul of
what I am

that you as
fellow divine and mortal
know
all too well

the suffering of a god — a god
that fears he has
no place in your Kingdom

for
you turned the water to wine
healed the sick, ministered
to the poor (people of
my heart too)
you danced, something in
your words
cannot resist
the dance

but I have words
in my domain, words that
destroy or create demons, unleash
the power of holy or
unholy storms
can break

the human heart
snap it
with joy, seal it
with sadness

what place for
this? For me?

which is why my
brother, friend

I have
journeyed here.

PHARISEE

Tags

arrogance, poem, poetry, power, religious, satire

PHARISEE

Jesus
was a Pharisee

you see
we rewrote
history

evangelical man
pinning his faith
to the
Word of
God
narrowly, and
in
obesity

and so
to close
we shall
sing the
hymn:

“Jesus was
a Pharisee”
(heard
it on TV)

IN PERSON

Tags

God, Jesus, poem, poetry, religious, spiritual

IN PERSON

Dear Lord

please forgive me
for loving
Jesus more

for loving St Francis more;
for even loving
Archbishop Tutu and
the Dalai Lama more

when next I get to see you
in person
I’ll explain it all
so carefully to you.

ON HOLD

Tags

poem, poetry, satire

ON HOLD

as a bank vault
the Church
is as vast

enough golden souls
it holds
to start
a treasury

they sing
as the spirit
bat-like
pings its way
off the ceiling and
around those walls

the song silvered, sort
of soaring

the message
placed on hold

SOVEREIGN

Tags

poem, poem poetry political moral, poetry, power, satire

SOVEREIGN

“…the things
that are Caesar’s”

who cares
which Emperor’s godlike head
is on the underside of the coin
(the way I flip it)

should the metal be trash
its value worthless
(nowhere
in the cosmos
where it
can be exchanged)?

but at least
these are from
our sacred mint
are ours to
play-play with

why bother
about poverty when
our value as a people
is absolutely redeemed