Humming
In that dark outlined light
of the transept I became
a nervous acolyte
breaking bread and snuffing
out the altar candle, considering
the stockpile of God in my
mouth
When asked, I’d panic
and say it tasted like swollen
pears, freshwater mussels
Heresy,
it seemed, began with the eyes
but always ended with the
tongue I learned
carrying the light away
from the sacristy, not to
stumble on the wrong
warfront of a name
Faith became tangible
when uttered
became familiar through
unknown sins and unsinned
knowns hurriedly pitched under
the bed my whole childhood
I whispered the name to
myself, feeling out
its hollowness
then its
disappointed promise
of vibration
*In this dark
curdled in Narthex bedroom,
revulsion chipped into a cell
ear pressed to wet rock,
men share holy
water and
to hear the throat’s humming
it must be hushed
*there is an acidic loveliness
to the phrase, “as a dog
returns to its own vomit,”
which recalls the mussel
tongue its only
leg and hobbling through
trenches of Lake Michigan
twelfth-hour men filling
its throat blocking epiphany’s
entrance, phonetics, rapture, but
Which heresy orders me to love? Out of love? And
I have never once thought myself hated by God;
Could I bare to love
other men
who would I be were I not
relapsed again
and again
under the Turin cloth of morning
blushing many colors
from its held
breath
Which heresy
configures my tongue
as temples across the world turn
to night;
candle put out;
shadowed shape of Yahweh
readying for the next gasp
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Zachary Dankert
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POETRY
Zachary Dankert is an aspiring creator from Indianapolis who tries to read serious literature but really just wants to read fantasy stories about mice. His published work can be found in The Fourth River, BreakBread Magazine, and Tofu Ink Arts Press, among others.
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