In seer's gnarled hands
our bones like knuckles
and marked with lore of chance,
the gestures of robes gathering dust
below the masks of banners.

In the church,
we waited. In the urban church,
we hunted for a lust that could not
be sated, the rapturous secrecy of
divine guidance that would burn
our lives with grace.

But it was up to men to make of themselves
the angels inscribed in stained glass.
It was up to women to make of themselves
the goddesses they desired, in elongated
curls of free will's unadulterated choice.

The priest claimed that not everyone
has a soul until it is built like castle walls
around the garden of the spirit. The priests,
let it be known, talked backwards into radio
recievers and burned effigies of better books
than the mason's lore wrapped in the lie of
sacred bindings. Striken with horrible fumes
of tattered beliefs, the cardinals and bishops
brought down the faith of their churches with
their own words, with their minor gestures,
with their rot bound in the decay of the past.

We fought them off with gleaming stance,
with steps of flawed chance written in
the armor of our bones. We knew a simple
life, where food and love were more important
than the idle proclamations of costumed letches.