He wept for a stretch time,
pendulous above the world,
where sunlight tucked under
the clouds and yet it warmed
his skin, traced over atoms
so familiar when easy prayers
numbed his insides so cold.
A creature of swift penance:
he used to mete his aches
among black veiled figures
he had believed as earthly
truths and infinite salvation.
Now, his eyes gave sight to
the memory fields, fingers
abandoned beads of thorns
into the holy water. Slow as
a stirring man waking from
an enduring winter, he left
the flood of hymnal chants
at his back with dead bolts
thrown like gunshots, toward
the smutty land that welcome
his absolution, where the idea
of mercy and grace cut open
to weight and voice of wisdom
in skepticism, like the surging
up of concrete through his offal
from those long ago stain-glass
psalms.