Gloria

A poem about my mother ...

If self awareness was
original sin then
what of that woman
who bore me
now?

Has she
(gone witless)
reversed God’s ire,
restored Eve to prefall purity,
regained Eden’s pristine clarity
in the insolent fluorescent haze
of Hilltop Haven?

Is scabrous skin thus
flawless flesh,
and hideous breath
the saccharine suspiration
of surpliced seraphim

who with bent heads and
barren gazes
glorify Almighty God
in hymns of unpremeditated
shrieking?

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