JOHNMICHAEL SIMON POETRY

He didn’t speak much but when he did

they all listened

after their busy chatter, shrill voices raised

their views irrelevant, irreverent

tongues making empty bucket protests

each in its own hollow clang

 

It has no truth he said

deviates from facts recounted

like a branch of orange grafted

on an oak, rain in a parched desert

it is as blessed is to sand

blessed he repeated, thrice blessed

one for the word, your thirsting souls

one for the land

 

He didn’t speak often but when he did

they all repeated

donned prayer shawls, wrote commentaries

discussed, each in his private wisdom

 

Some prayed together, sang, rejoiced

others clanging bucket protests

pulled down the walls and burnt the tree

replaced them with sharp corners, steel and glass

 

These are the truths they sang

as they impaled him on a doorpost

cut each others wrists with jagged shards