Broken Statues
holy child with broken arm,
please keep me away from harm,
as far away as you were close
to bleeding head and broken nose,
victim of man
help me if you can!
sweet bambino on holy card,
victims of exploding shards!
divinity of spattered ink,
keep me from the fears I think
from my tomorrow,
road of sorrow!
Mary, jogger on bloody feet,
walking barefoot on the street
in the night of early dawn;
apocalypse decathalon,
now in training,
dark and raining.
oil discovering crucifix,
wellspring of our politics,
keep the candles til the end,
obscured,unlit, and never spend;
geology's
doxologies.
Joseph of the chipped paint,
father, carpenter, and saint
joiner with wooden pins,
let Him now forgive our sins;
treaty our days
in heaven's ways.
who will be the alpha saint
to cudgel us, box, and feint;
leading unruly canonized
in their daily exercise:
for fool's gold
our souls are sold.
little babe with broken nose,
broken arm and missing toes,
dropped upon my bedroom floor
soon to be killed hardcore:
the end of Lent,
all Passion spent.
--
notes
The religious icons of my childhood come pouring forth in a time of discord. I have a statue with a broken arm and this is Nuestra Senora del Brazo Roto, and it is the arm of the Christ child that is broken.
My frame of mind in this week of Washington and Norway.
stanza 1
keep me as far away from harm as you were close to it; i.e., being beaten by the Roman soldiers, etc.
stanza 2
road of sorrow = via dolorosa, the route of the Cross carrying.
stanza 3
Mary was in training for pain from early on. Private and searing pain in the darkness.
stanza 4 crucifix
in the old days, people used to have crucifixes in their houses in which were stored the oil for the time of death and the candles to be lit at that time. The top of the crucifix slid back to uncover these things.
Politics of death and unlit candles, faith buried so deep that true belief (doxology) is only discoverable by deep geology through time.
stanza 5
St. Joseph,, father of Jesus.
treaty - make agreement between two things.
stanza 6
today... saints and men fighting to be the Alphas and beat their chests in holiness, yet beholden only to power and money and the currency of their unenlightened minds.
stanza 7
prayer to Jesus, soon to grow up and to be killed in the liturgical period of time after Lent and three days before Easter.
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