Mystery, Play and Other Poems
Mystery, Play
Rather than the miracles, one-acts of all the failures—
Samson’s pillow talk, Cain sacrificing a still life of pomegranates,
Sarah offering Hagar as a gift to her husband,
Hagar unable to refuse. I left the religion but kept the sin
and its images. Keep catching snakes and feeding them apples onstage.
After intermission, God’s more recent debacles—
and its images. Keep catching snakes and feeding them apples onstage.
After intermission, God’s more recent debacles—
tsunamis, polar bears, the nurse who said my mother could
go home, the doctor who misread her chart, the dream in which
my mother pins herself to the mattress
go home, the doctor who misread her chart, the dream in which
my mother pins herself to the mattress
with hypodermic needles in her wrists—painless, forsaken,
overprepared for namelessness. Her suffering transformed
no one, least of all herself.
overprepared for namelessness. Her suffering transformed
no one, least of all herself.
