SUNDAY NURSERY FOR GODS


The Gods here are tender,
their hands woven 
from the same threads as our hearts, 
so their fingers have 
fractured bones like our prayers.
Their heads are oily with 
knuckle kisses of candles,
and smells of split ends of an ocean.
They play with flowers, 
colours running like 
wet ink on a page,  
like love seeps through 
cracks even in the midst of a war.
They can't stand still, 
with one foot in grief 
and the other in laughs , 
while their patience 
runs out in whimps.
They ask for sweets 
as snacks, afraid of 
tormenting holy tongues 
with something unholy 
like the cry of an orphan girl.
Because their mouths taste 
like sickness of spring,
the stories of a land 
where honey flows and 
butterflies are not hungry, 
doesn't excite them.
They don't know 
how to colour,
since rainbows are 
slippage of their memories.
They cry in audible whispers 
and we call it prophecy.
They laugh in inaudible winds, 
and we call it rain.
They are half desire
and half weapon.
They are part home
and part grave.
When they sleep in the cold floor 
without sacred fire near them,
they look like 
Marigolds
Peaches
Torture.
We worship them because
an ache needs a scar.

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