I understand now
it is readying time
everywhere preparing
the next real revolution
will be christian versus
christian -- it is inevitable
those who think they own
Jesus taking up arms against
those who are Jesus unbeknownst
those whose innards burn
whose inner realization can
no longer abide the hateful
outers who bank Jesus who
kneel to Jesus after their cruelty
garners enough votes to crucify
again their prop and circumstances
forecast a good stock market
tomorrow, thank you thank you
There are two kinds of christians
the inner holy and the outer holding
all the cards in their poker game
the outers send their Jesus to ride
with gangsters and mercenaries to
beat and imprison the stranger
the inners attend to bleeding faces
visit the impounded, place their
bodies between batons and beatings
I sense the next revolution will be
between the true and the false, the
christ-like and the cynical masks
fronting a false narrative of hate
dressed as popular jingoist lies
befuddling a mesmerized populace
will there be bloodshed? Yes
will there be chaos? Yes
will the country be rift? Yes
We near the time when semblance
will no longer resemble what is real
when what is false will collapse and fall
I tell you -- this will not be a war of ideas
this will be a tearing apart of dissemblance
a throat cut of dissimilitude of the crude unholy
I will hide in the loft of my barn, in my cell
as christian against christian clank and clatter
tossing charters and chapters of scripture at
each other, parading credentials and certifications
temporary restraining orders and articles of heresy
sacramentals and letters of passage and patronage
none of which will make a difference when bullets
fly, when knives are unsheathed, when messiahs with
bitcoin certificates storm houses and sanctuaries
making america god’s address red hats will proliferate
but bare-headed protectors will bow and advance
no more fear, only, no more camouflaged hypocrite
And where is the Christ-Itself in this conflagration?
I don’t think we will know. There will be no deus-ex-
machina, no white-hat on white-horse entering town
Christ-Itself will remain, as always, away/within out
of sight -- no material appearance behind a podium,
no emergency alert on all airwaves, no full page ad --
Christ-Itself will remain, as always, away/within deeply
centered and uncircumferenced; (to misquote Philip Whelan):
invisible and incomplete uncontrollable everything
~fin~
... ... ...
Poem by Philip Whalen:
4:2-59 Take I
What I need is lots of money
No
What I need is somebody to love with unparalleled energy
and devotion for 24 hours and then goodbye
I can escape too easily from this time & this place
That isn’t the reason I’m here
What I need is where am I
Sometimes a bed of nails is really necessary to any man
Or a wall (Olson, in conversation, “That wall, it has to be there!”)
Where are my hands.
Where are my lungs.
All the lights are on in here I don’t see nothing.
I don’t admit that this is personality disintegration
My personality has a half-life of iox years; besides
I can put my toe in my mouth
If (CENSORED), then (CENSORED), something like
Plato his vision of the archetypal human being
Or the Gnostic Worm.
People see me; they like that . . .
I try to warn them that it’s really me
They don’t listen; afterwards they complain
About how I had no right to be really just that:
Invisible & in complete control of everything
(—Poem by Philip Whelan, pp 26-27, in On Bear’s Head, 1960)
