I remember the first time I touched a crucifix.
I was five years old, alone, in my grandmother’s
powder-blue bathroom, unaware of suffering and sacrifice,
unaware of the million and one ways a sinner could torture
a saint and still get away with it, when I felt compelled
to caress Christ’s hard, flexed veins that arched
from his shin bones, muscles, pretty feet.
The crucifix was nailed to the floral-pattern wall
next to the light switch, His eyes forever cast down,
staring at my grandmother’s personal things,
little nighttime rituals – boxes of Polident, chalky antacids,
rosary beads, her little jars of beauty cream and that
tethered picture of her only son, my father, a little boy
dressed for holy communion, mimicking hands of prayer,
mimicking the face of innocence, wedged securely
inside the edge of the switch.
About the author:
My poems have been featued in The Blue Jew Yorker, The Furnace Review, Straitjackets, Silenced Press, Glass Poetry Journal and forthcoming Fall issues of The Potomac and Heavy Bear. Poem “Washing Dishes” was nominated for Best New Poets 2009. I’m currently working on my first chapbook entitled “After the Reception.”
