Epistle to Jesus

Epistle to Jesus

Dear Sir,

there is still a lot of evil in the world
i hope you didn’t die in vain
that would be sooo depressing
at least for you
of course, why on earth
would you give a hoot
up in heaven and all

you could probably run with this one
whisper the moral in a good shepherd’s ear
to wit:

just twenty minutes ago
an example of all the evil
some loser and blasphemer
tried to run me off redan road
but don’t worry
i told him how much you loved him
before i shot him
but don’t worry
i judged him not
lest i be judged
it probably helps
that I missed

jesus, I hope you don’t mind

i hope you don’t mind a few questions
everyone says you’re so wise and loving
everyone says you know so much
ok, here’s a question:
amelia earhart and her navigator fred noonan
took off from new guinea heading for howard island
and they were never heard from again
well the question is
don’t you think there should be a word for that?
Besides m-i-s-s-i-n-g?
because so much of what we are
is just like that
exciting and sexy and possibly important
we take flight like Amelia earhart
and then we miss the mark or disappear
friends of mine have disappeared like that

may be the word for the thing that no word fits is - - -
disappearhart
you could probably run with that one
from here to next Sunday’s sermon

you yourself did disappearharted
yes you did
three days in a hole in the ground
except you didn’t exactly take flight
til later and then it was more like floating
instead of flight. People don’t fly
to heaven,
the soul drifts straight up through clouds
right to the pearly gates.
All souls floating straight up
and all find themselves at the same gate.

you could probably run with that one
from here to next Sunday’s sermon

ok, while you’re thinking about that
did you know that on this day in 1961
earnest hemingway committed suicide
in ketchum idaho
that’s too bad because
if someone else had shot him
i betcha they would ketchum
or else I da ho
just think about it jesus

but don’t worry, that’s not the question
the question is
they discovered only a modest amount of genetic variation
between people and a gypsy moth
we the people and they the gypsy moths
are about eighty or ninety per cent exactly the same genetically, (we traded wings for longevity)

that information may seem quite disturbing
you can see where a person might lose
some faith in science
but jesus, you and i and george bush and
saddam hussein
are about 99.9 per cent identical
i bet you’re glad you died or resurrected or whatever
before that ugly fact escaped the labs
so the question is
doesn’t that creep you out?
are you rolling in your metaphorical grave
or symbolic tomb or gauzy shroud?
how can only one one-hundredth of a per cent
which is really only one-one thousandth of the genome
account for the difference between the lives
of you and me and him and him?
not to mention mae west and kim novak and kathy beavers

anyway, sometimes it all works out
that guy who tried to run me off the road
became a good friend
we’re like the guys in the bar fight
i’m sure you’ve been there
you know the forty days
“wandering in the desert” wink-wink
he, the guy, my friend, helped me write this epistle
then when i went to mail it
he shot me
but he missed
you could probably run with that one
from here to next Sunday’s sermon

by the boy poets, keepin' in touch