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Friday 1 July 2011

...and What the Bishop said.

Continuing with yesterday's prompt from Jingle Poetry - and maybe stretching it a little...!

Southwark,
the Cathedral,
and the nave is full.
Young people
and their parents
(mostly),

all in sober dress.
Only I am standing out,
the solitary poppy
in an endless field of corn,
the redness of my cassock
like a beacon to the world.
(Or so the priest had said.
He'd been insistent:
God demands it of you, David,
you are an altar boy,
and you must be confirmed as one,
you are a witness to the fact,
your cassock is a part of that.)

So God made me conspicuous;
prominence upset digestion and
a frightful pain ensued
along with constant rumbles
and deep-down forceful movements
of my frail tectonic plates.
Location made things worse.

Positioned at the very foot of
what became Mount Hermon,
looking up to see the Bishop,
scarlet robes aglow.
Transfigured, fired-up
as the sermon flowed,
he hammered out his theme.
Relentless repetition.
And every time he'd look at me -
I swear it -
straight and eye-to-eye -
and growl again,
the umpteenth time,
with ne'er a smile
how sinners feel discomfort
in the presence of the Lord!

9 comments:

SG said...

All of us have been sinners at one point or the other. If not anything else, the discomfort is our punishment.

jabblog said...

Oh, the discomfort of feeling one has transgressed in unknown ways!

Isabel Doyle said...

that priest was a sensitive chap, wasn't he?

Mary said...

I can remember times of thinking that the minister was speaking TO me...specifically. OUCH.

The Weaver of Grass said...

I think the Bishop had his eye on you just as a point of contact Dave - nothing personal, you understand!

CiCi said...

Comes from having a conscience I think. I truly dislike glaring eyes and mental attacks.

Anonymous said...

Enjoy yourself.
Freedom of religion/speech is encouraged.

awesome entry,
Happy Potluck!

Windsmoke. said...

Preaching fire and brimstone is nothing more than scare tactics to scare the pants off sinners. Doesn't really work because we go back and commit the same sin time after time after time :-).

Dave King said...

SG
The first bit's true, for sure. The second sounds like human-think rather than divine.

jabblog
Exactly!

Isabel
Er... not sure.

Mary
Some preachers have that gift. Yes, I've known a few like that!

The Weaver of Grass
Yes, I've done the same thing myself a few times since - or he may have been wondering why that boy was wriggling around such a lot!

TechnoBabe
I think I'd have to agree with that.

Jingle Poetry
or freedom of speech?religion is encouraged? Thanks for the wish.

Windsmoke
Absolutely, though to give the Bish his due, he wasn't preaching fire and brimstone, just saying that human nature being what it is, discomfort is an unavoidable consequence of wrong behaviour.