Anthony Carelli - Sermon

[mythomanic]

Sermon

The poet is a liar.
- Fernando Pessoa

Every morning we would hoist Victor's father
    from the moist sheets, holding him for a third
      to sponge his flanks and milk-sack thighs.
       "Put your elbow under the shoulder," Victor
         instructed. "If his eyes open, you speak to him."
           One day a doctor interrupted our ritual.
              "Look: I think your father smiles," he said.

And turning back, we couldn't help believing.
   No matter our suspicion of the doctor's simple savvy,
     nor the fact of a familiar face inverted, inert,
        we were children again, bodiless, it seemed,
          gathered and held kite-like above our father's head,
            lifted up to pluck the last armful of apples -
              the best ones, he said: the ones he couldn't reach.

-- Anthony Carelli, from Carnations