Stroll into any old story, the ones they used to tell
in prairie town coffee-klatch cafés;
the ones they used to share in small sober groups
and store up for mid-week prayer meetings;
the ones the old preacher used for illustrations, down
at the Rock of Ages Church on the edge of the village:
about the young widow gone off to the city;
about the farmer who bailed hay on Sunday;
about the spots of blood on the steps of the beer hall
and the stranger found unconscious outside of town;
about the man who moved in with another man;
about the psychologist’s teenage daughter;
about the Deacon’s son who went to that university;
about the fall and the plagues, AIDS and the pale horse,
about the glorious last harvest of wheat shook from weeds;
“You can’t change,” rumbled the old Reverend,
“unless you fear All Mighty God!”
And when the old pastor retired and a new pastor came
and told stories about birds with broken wings,
about an aunt who mops floors at some inner-city shelter,
and said, “You can’t change if you don’t love,” many people left
to find the old pastor and talk him out of retirement:
and they built him a new church, where he could
proclaim the word,
but it’s been a big disappointment
as now he only wants to speak
about the way light can play on the lake
(not once alluding to that fiery one),
about the mystery and beauty of a sinking sun
and hearing drums and wooden flutes coming over the dark water,
and how he isn’t even sure it was God
who stopped the rain in time for the church picnic.
And even though it’s been a couple years since his wife died
he can’t seem to get positive about the Apocalypse.
