By Rich Hadley
I am my childhood pastor
preaching in the old time way
anointing my stubborn and defiant congregation
on their unwashed, calloused hands and eager foreheads
On Monday—
I am the unpaid office help
watching an unringing phone
for mandatory hours
a prisoner of [some prior pastor’s] war
More often—
I am our only custodian
wet T-shirt bouncing atop a mower, that coughs as it smokes
and rants about its clogged carburetor,
missing a call for clergy for someone rushed into emergency surgery
Right now—
I am a last minute Sunday school sub
bearing witness from dirty windows in an empty classroom
that the least-of-these stumbles into the crosswalk
falling from a solid sidewalk square onto black asphalt graveled from wear
An evangelist encased by the facade of faded wood paneling
and wall paper whose glue has grown tired watches her
crumple under a stuffed gray duffel and wonders if she must bear all this because of me, and here is where I heard
Empty
cry out
from
my pockets
and all my sermon words