“For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face…”
1 Corinthians 13:12 (KJV)
I reserve Sunday evenings for roaming hushed suburbia, rendered in sensual warmth
Sporadic puffs of cloud cut by dimming honeyed light.
Feeling bittersweet steam turn to tepid bliss in the Autumn air, as I weave
Past throngs of people in button-up shirts and flesh-coloured stockings.
Watching, as they exchange thin-lipped smiles, cordial conversation between white picket fenced families.
I soak up the pleasantries just in earshot as I wander by like I
Soak in the fading heat.
I hang back, though, as they scuttle inside the looming oak doors -
Always from a comfortable distance.
Hollow bells will echo throughout the still sky by cue at any moment
Mothers will beckon their children to be quiet as they fidget in the varnished wooden pews.
It’s an engrained routine known all too well.
I laugh at the monotony of it all, yet still find myself brushing my hand over my left shoulder
My right
As I listen to the sound of striking metal emitted from the steeple.
A cacophony of voices sing inharmoniously -
Shrivelled, squeaky, filled with piety.
The distant hymns of praise seem locked behind my tongue, bubbling in my throat, unable to escape from parted lips -
But I know them, for I always will.
And I wonder if I’ll ever be able to unwrite the pages of a past life that are engrained in ink, carved into open palms.
Perhaps they have scarred forever -
Keloidal bumps hidden in my lifelines -
Like the inescapable burning in my knees as I imagine the people inside kneeling
Bones cracking, scraping against the rough carpet.
A sanctimonious sacrifice of comfort that would turn
Bundled flesh violet in anyone weaker in faith.
I always donned a palette of greens the days following mass.
Prodding at these blown-up veins in my calves was a distraction from the
Metallic burning ripping through my sternum, the trickling of nausea and stinging bile
At each mention of being granted salvation for sin.
Mortal or venial was the question that echoed -
A scratched record in my mind as I methodically categorised
The collection of fragments framed as my life.
A series of misfortunes held between my ribs
Curled neatly into the pocket of my soul
Which I eventually accepted as something the Most High could not redeem.
They’ll move neatly, quietly, to single file lines soon
Ambling with their heads bowed down towards the altar.
Blood
Was the sweetest nectar to receive.
I still remember using the back of my hand to wipe my
Maroon-tinged mouth
The first time I was blessed with such a bitter delight.
The stares of the stained-glass windows, figures decorated in highest honour through
Rich coloured shards
Casting their gazes down in permanent disapproval, still linger.
Leaded silence somehow screaming in my mind even now.
When the sky darkened in biblical rage, droplets skidded down these revered faces until it seemed they wept for me
In technicolour.
I used to question whether bolting into the downpour mid homily would help the
Porcelain mosaics of women see that I could not be absolved clean of my coward conscience –
If forgiveness were that easy
The salt leaking from my weary eyes would have kept me saintly.
My stations of guilt disguised as contemplative Lenten afternoons were marked by such glass figures.
Faltering at number nine as he fell for the third time.
Shallow breaths slipped from my lungs as I gazed upwards
At the adorned figure wearied by the weight of the cross.
The curve of his spine painted by yellowed shards mimicked my own
The hunch of intangible burdens seen in my coiled figure.
Light rays refracted, dancing across his sunken face, and yet all I could see was
My own kaleidoscope of suffering.
After all these years, I still can’t help but ask if he truly saw me
Pitied my imitation, seeming obedience
Or rather
Resented me for claiming his weight of suffering as mine to bear.
From outside, the fragmented colours are no longer creamy or warm.
Brown, dulled.
On occasion, I long to be able to catch a glimpse of the vivid reds and oranges as intended for the merciful.
For the pressure in my knees from kneeling too long in the cramped confessional booth
The stench of fine dust and incense that lay too thick in my lungs still follow me around
In ghostly remnants.
They always stroll out of the sacred sanctuary before divine intervention calls my name.
And I slowly make my way back in bleak twilight
Broken up by freckled stars, to roam the empty streets.
Past kempt lawns and tire swings and
White picket fences.
Some confessions are better left unsaid.
