CHOIRBOYS AND CLERGYMEN
By Elliot Chester
I want to reconcile with the almighty. These are
the words I mutter as I enter church. Alone. Traipsing
on the narrow, burgundy carpet, this reminds me of a
steamrolled tongue and already my thoughts start
subduing. Thinking of my choirboy days, my psyche
cracks like the Renaissance saints upon stained glass
windows. I poise on a knee-dented cushion, feeling
contempt dawdling. Devil red lights hang like squandered
hearts, beaming and pulsing. The air tastes like a stubbed
cigar dipped in frankincense and the holy water to my right
smells like a wet patch after sex. I want to replace the chalices
with hollowed horns of Baphomets. So much for me making
amends in the house of God. Ghostly shadows of nuns emerge
from the altar; showing me halos with sin’s hallmark and I,
dumbfounded, feel shameful before a faith I almost welcomed.
Confession: I killed a clergyman once. He said my voice was
baritone, not tenor. I christened him soprano as I struck his
balls with a lavabo bowl, then once again to the temple.
Blood. News travels faster than expedited prayers. I claimed
self-defense and, years later, the stigma remains. Now, the
unmanned organ plays unharmonious hymns with a
throng of bum notes as the virtuous pour in like Noah’s
flood for Sunday service. They look at me like I took a
shit on sacramental bread and pissed in the blood of
Christ. To them, I’m a wooden plank. Sodden.
Obsolete. Peerless to the Ark.