The very rafters all at once fall beating on my ears
As that high-pitching shriek of joy
Swoops arrow-black above, is gone,
And silver-rippled echoes ring-drop radiance
In showers
On sinners here below
Correctly placed
In Sunday-sober pews.
Again;
The prayer-hung heights are ripped apart,
He hurtles dark,
The candles flick,
He screams and screams
And dips above the table of the God
To be born up and over, flung warm-heart over,
Joy-heart over the screen,
Tossed on the swelling breaker of his whole adoring.
Men sleep, muse thin in the sun;
“...praise ye the Lord,”
Nod in the sermon,
Sleep in the sun, sleep.
Dark swift.
Why don’t we scream?
Why don’t we stand on our silly feet,
Stamp on the seats and yell
Arms out, wild and forever
Praise we the Lord?
(July,
1971)
