St. Francis

And so we almost die:
a no-fault collision,
and a creeping guilt conquering like a viral
Emperor of the West.
Enthroned European
and beaming,
certainly
(I think passing through the corridor
with the graphic crucifixes
and No Smoking signs)
we have taken a wrong turn.
And I have betrayed myself.
Trust, as a conceptual issue
has lost all of the relevance
it has never deserved:
we need to be made
to believe
and I
am okay
with that.
Hell of a legacy
we inherited,
I guess.

I need
to believe
I need to believe
in a revision;
in an insecure Jesus,
self-doubting and full of missteps and
awkward pauses waiting to unleash themselves
upon future Canonical editors
("This too shall pass.")
and embarrassingly stuttered speeches
from hilltops, eyes fixed on the sun-scorched soil.
A minor boost to His self-confidence,
from the news of Judas Iscariot and the Legion,
because one betrayal pales in comparison to the
Twelve that kept him awake at nights,
and so gave him something to live for long enough
to die.
And yet the scholars tell me I am wrong,
casting about ideas like stones
by children in some past
free from the reality that has severed it's own,
but
here in this shrine of desperation and hope and loss
coexist this macabre symbol of I don't even know anymore
with all the corporate advances of modern medicine,
and in passing I think:
maybe I am on to something.
The teachings are not in what is said
or done
or passed on in any way,
and yet,
we've learned
to not trust ourselves,
and that sounds bad,
I know,
I know,
but think
of the options.