Confessions

In a country room a girl hasn't had
any food or water for seventeen 
days. Her eyes weep blood. 
Then she eats only blessed wafers
for more than half a year and yet 
weighs the same. 

                     Is there a reason the t in the word 
martyr looks like a giant cross, like the one 
that looms over I-75 exit 141 in La Follette, 
Tennessee and supposedly protects
Christian travelers from the triple x
porn store next door?   

My grandmother warned 
about the evils in this world, 
most of them not even exuding 
an evil vibe. The sheer nightgown
not a relief during sweltering nights,
but a strumpet's costume shrilling
danger danger come hither to bands
of marauding mosquitoes.

               Didn't Augustine say
Make me chaste, Lord,
but not yet?

                           It's a miracle 
when I can find both my car
keys and my house keys; when 
I make it just in time for a meeting 
I didn't even know I had. 

Look I'm truly sorry for all the shitty
unsaintly things I've said or done.
I hate to see suffering in others
as in myself, though perhaps
not in exactly the same way.

                Mostly I'm like you, I think:
I cry when hurt, cheat on diets,
only want desperately 
to be loved by those I'm told
I shouldn't be wasting any
more time on.

It's terrible. 
It's glorious and terrible.
I just want all of it.
You know, 
sometimes.