An Exile Returns for the Good Friday Spectacle

An exile returns
for the Good Friday
spectacle:

blod and gore
the flagellants'
vow to become pure
like the wound
becoming sore
on their backs,
spike against
the fresh cut
blade shining
in the tropical sun
against flesh
that has memorized hunger
since the beginning
of time
in these islands
of sin and regret
of revolutions
and repeated resurrections
from the dead.

This is the nation
where the exile lives now,
temporarily, to remind
himself of perennial pains
the 110 Freeway in LA
has masked with speed
and the rush to work
with the urgency of penance
to memorize
the edges of returns
like this one
that he takes for a summer
of watching this rite
of renewing faith
by not believing
in the promises of palaces
and the politicos
who live in them
as if they are born
to these places
that deny us of grace.

The blood, red and glinting
in the noonday light
in the murderous heat,
drips to fill
an exile's memory
he keeps in his pocket.

He prays no thieves
will come and snatch this scene,
the irredeemable sinners
from the the first words
of storm seasons
announcing cleansing,
only cleansing
like this Good Friday's
play of possibilities.

The alter christus in the middle
breathes his last
and he is brought down
from his wooden cricifix,
stands up to nurse
the nails with antibiotics,
the gauze as clean as his consciences,
the anaesthetic going to waste.



Good Friday
Marikina