National Poetry Month Begins on Easter, Passover, and April Fool's Day

April is National Poetry Month, and as usual during this month, I will be posting poems to this blog throughout the month. In 2018, however, the beginning of National Poetry Month is also April Fool's Day, Passover, and Easter, a powerful concoction of influences.

This first poem for National Poetry Month, then, is one that plays with the history of Christianity, Judaism, and the basic concept of the Holy Fool or the fool for God.

LAMENT OF A FAILED ACOLYTE

Desperation can come from having nothing but God to love.

                                         --Michael Heffernan

Desperation I’ve a long acquaintance with.

Desperation and hope

have been the twin pillars

between which I’ve sailed,

trying to avoid being eaten alive

or sucked in,

aiming at the narrow gate

sometimes called Jesus

who’s run me aground on hope.

Unlike despair, hope’s not a sin

against the Holy Spirit but only

against logic and forty years’ experience

wandering in this hungry desert,

waiting for white wafers of grace

to descend and bring another presence.

If I sound mad, it’s no wonder,

in this shaggy, lice-ridden skin

with blood of locusts on my tongue.

My big mistake was asking

I AM

in for company.

Avoid divine guests, I say

now, drowning in painful, terrifying love.

There’s been a mix-up somewhere.

I put in a request for ecstasy,

not passion.

Published in Heart's Migration (Tia Chucha Press, 2009)