No Vacancy


I thought he had been taken down;
supposed him really gone,
presumed his same but second self
lived somewhere else by now and
I loved that place.
I imagined hands, both soft and calloused
had pried his slippery, red and tough skin from spikes
and gentle souls clumsily lowered
the heavy flopping holy cocoon to the dirt.
Amidst sobs of horror, angry tears, silent despair,
what was left of him was rolled up in
cloths which could have been mere bandages,
had he just loved them a little less
and this life, a little more.
I believed he had been carried off,
and people did what's done to those who go this way;
now unrecognizable, some blood wiped off
revealed only hardened layers more
and the bulging purple puffy bloat of blackened bruises,
the jagged open gaping lacerations,
the exposed white of bone;
but all knew who He used to be.
It was my understanding that
when carried off to seal his corpse
inside that dead dark vault of stone,
he did in fact do only what the Son of God could do:
in death, he lay and listened;
an almighty crack occurred,
snapped the iron thread which tied his soul to hell
and he woke up where he is now, or so I'd thought.
I had adjusted to the notion that atrocious fee he'd paid
which when believed buys room and board, was enough;
enough to set aside my guilt of being there
serving with those who killed him;
was enough to carve some kind of hope
out of this toilsome life;
was enough to let Christ finally rest in peace.
And then I opened my front door,
through the screen saw in my yard
that he still hung there, not yet dead,
barely breathing, turned his head to watch me.
I became a clutching child behind barbed wire
whose scratched-up arms stretched through the fence
to claw the air,
to do whatever needed done, anything,
but he's still there.
I'd always been so surely sure
this dying part was over.

Copyright (c) 2008 Gary Brown