©2015 by Jack A. Urquhart

Come Sunday morning,
he runs the streets,
pants and puffs past houses
familiar since kindergarten,
the former homes
of former friends.
Instead of Sunday School,
he attends the alleyways,
side-steps puddles behind the VFW,
its parking lot redolent
of the last Supper:
barbecue and corn on the cob,
stale beer, soured potato salad.
Come the Sabbath,
instead of hosannas,
he raises a dust,
sprints the bricked streets,
those WPA relics
of his Grandfather’s time,
moldy as Methuselah.
In lieu of Jee-suz,
he follows a sweaty pace,
celebrates human sacrifice
in his own slogging way,
conscious that every year
makes him slower,
every stride closer
to the finish line.
And yet…
from now until then,
there are watercolor sunrises
and Cinderella moons,
silver-slippered
on the steps of dawn;
there are humid mornings
dank as high school locker rooms,
and cocks and crows in the city park.
All this, even if there is no point,
nor hope of understanding,
nothing that can decode
the mystery of a beating heart,
or what spins stars, planets
and human beings ad infinitum
into the vastness of space.
Nevertheless…
Come Sunday morning,
he runs the streets,
senses tuned to the divine
against the off-chance
of a sudden revelation.