New poem: "The Lady Is a Christian`"

 

The Lady Is a Christian

 

Tethered to the fence post of propriety,

her home, yard, and religion bound her freedom

from the open spaces of her soul. A kind lady

without, a cautious lady within, she speaks

her mind because she has earned the right; but

she can never admit that she may be wrong,

and stretches the hubris of her tether

to the snapping point.

 

She does not believe in the Virgin Birth, nor

in the stain of Original Sin; she cannot buy into

the resurrection of Jesus Christ, but maintains

that she is a Christian. She believes that the soul

is eternal, but cannot fathom how her soul can

pre-exist before its birth in Time, and this confuses

her Christian mind and stretches the hubris

of her tether to the snapping point.

 

She serves Jesus daily on the altar of her home,

yard, and gardens; and before she goes to bed at night,

she prays for strength to live another day because

her life is incomplete. She desperately wants the key

to spiritual freedom, which lies in her own heart;

but her mind keeps getting in the way, and stretches

the hubris of her tether to the snapping point.

 

A tireless widow of eighty, she is the envy of all

her peers, cleaning her immaculate home daily,

mowing her beautiful lawn, tending to her flower

and vegetable gardens, and walking three miles

every day; but she loves to smoke cigarettes

and justifies her harmful habit by calling it her

only vice, and stretches the hubris of her

tether to the snapping point.

 

She attends Bible classes weekly to learn the way,

the truth, and the life; but her pastor lost his faith

and wears his collar to pay the bills, and the evening

wears thin as she listens to his agnostic gruel. But

on behalf of her savior Jesus Christ, she stretches the

hubris of her tether to the snapping point, because

in her heart the lady is a Christian.

 

Composed in Nipigon, Ontario

Date unknown: 1990-2000