University Club Svengali
The Poet Finley stood irreverent
Bypassing the podium
Insensitive to protocol
Replacing verse
With an account of loss
The stage became a confessional
Of which he took full advantage
By starting off the evening
Announcing he’d fired God
He didn't qualify as agnostic
He didn't convert to atheism
He fully believed in a supreme being
And terminated this companion
In ceremony and silence
Half the audience became unnerved
Pointing out, that heresy starts off
When manners become unleashed
But the rest of us fell into a trance
Knowing what our dear friend had lost
Let the blasphemy be spoken: poetry can save us,
ReplyDeletenot the way a fisherman pulls the drowning swimmer
into his boat, not the way Jesus, between screams,
promised life everlasting to the thief crucified beside him
on the hill, but salvation nevertheless.
Somewhere a convict sobs into a book of poems
from the prison library, and I know why
his hands are careful not to break the brittle pages.
--Martin Espada
"Blasphemy" from The Trouble Ball (Norton, 2012)
Wow....that is such a nice addition "TILT"...thank you
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