Two Stanzas So Far

1

Someone said there's a place in my Head where the Living and the Dead carry on discourse.

I denied that anything inside could be forced to provide any proof of being in there.

Then the giggle of the Chorus who had gone so long before us burbled up through the porous part of Me I call my Mind.

Laughing they said that I'd made my Bed and to argue with the Dead proved me Madder than I'd feared.

I inhaled my Dread realizing I'd fed my Sanity on the Bread that They couldn't really be there.

Once again the Chorus giggled as upon my chair I wiggled and the line I drew grew squiggled between Them and Me.

So misled - so many Years I sought a Thread to follow backwards in my Head to take me to my Source.

2

Then I fled, the Mark of Cain upon my head. Which was oddly God's protection since my Brother now lay Dead.

I denied that I was Filthy Screaming "I cannot be Guilty!" yet the One who knew my Truth had Loved me more than I could fathom.

Then the Sinless Self-Professors told their Lies to their Confessors and as One pointed fingers at my Guilt. Shouting DAMNED!

Laughing they said that I'd left my Brother Dead and for me there was no Heaven. It was Hell that I should Dread.

I cried until I bled. I beat my chest. "My Life Instead!"

Once again the Chorus sounded while my beating fists still pounded but the words they said resounded through the Torment in my Soul.

Peace instead. So many years you have ahead to follow forward as a thread to bring you to My side.

Creepy Little Left-hand Stigmata Wound

Creepy Little Left-hand Stigmata Wound sat slouched in the towel I'd wrapped it in making soft sucking sounds to itself - rhythmic, almost musical. It continued, the only sound in the room, until my curiosity overcame me, "Tell me, " I ventured, "do tell me, Creepy Little Left-hand Stigmata Wound, how I can ring me up some Jesus to rain down on my head? My spark is stuck in the flesh-web in my brain. I need me some Jesus to rain down on my head."

Silence broken by the sucking sound the wound made - rhythmic almost musical. The next voice was not my own.

"You are SO human!" my kitty cat uncurled in the space beneath my chin and giggled, "Oh SO human and SO all alone! Calling out for the one thing that's never left you. Pity Man, so sure of himself and yet suspended over the gulf of Eternity - his Forever teeters first one way then another."

As usual my kitty cat made more sense than a kitty cat should but her wise words were instantly lost on my slippery soul so again I ventured, "Tell me please, Creepy Little Left-hand Stigmata Wound, tell me HOW I can ring me some Jesus to rain down on my poor head?"

It made a smack, its red-ringed mouth slippery as I bled, then silent a second it seemed to think.

"Listen to itself it must!" Its voice a moist, hoarse whisper, "The jug of wine calls out it thirsts! The dinner dies of hunger!"

The "h" in "hunger" bubbled blood, so absently I wiped it clean. My kitten laughed her meowing laugh to fill the awkward moment.

"From Paradise it banished its silly Self! (said banish-shed, Shakespearean)." Smack smack - it giggled? - then it fell mute, its riddle slowly forming like the scab that dried on my forearm. It had drizzled blood since early morning.

For an instant I might have understood, epiphany triumphant. Then Fear, my favorite feeling, Father of all the Others, overcame my clarity. It was too easy, a trick - might I be the source of my own Eternity? In my horror I cried, "Too simple! It must be Complex, a snarl of rules, a list of Steps!" I shook my arm in anger and the Creepy Little Left-hand Stigmata Wound seemed to cough, the blood flow increasing,"I have been taught to believe in a Chosen few, no Infidels allowed! The Diverse made Same Forever and Ever, Amen."

"Man's Rules, not God's!" It raised its voice. I blinked back tears.

"If true," I whispered,"then all I've learned of Grace and God must be replaced. All my Doing wasted. My frantic quest to be redeemed. My spark alone enough for Heaven's gate - not earned but given - a Loving Fate."

"Mm Hm, " it hummed, my Kitten purred. The Universe buzzed around me.

The Fool, in tears I spoke again,"Please tell me, Creepy Little Left-hand Stigmata Wound, tell me HOW I can ring me some Jesus to rain down on my poor head?"

My Lesson lost, I begged a task, assignment, cost, some work to do to earn it. My Kitten ceased her purring, spun a circle curling up with her ass dismissively in my face. Among the three of us I was the least enlightened.

Suck-suck, suck-suck - rhythmic almost musical. Creepy Little Left-hand Stigmata Wound sat slouched in the towel I'd wrapped it in making soft sucking sounds to itself. The only sound in the room...