Jesus in a Dive Bar
I have tried to be saviors of men
But I have been a messy messiah
A breathable sin. Betwixt the salt and sugar
The gin, I have been unholy water
A baptism of skin as I walk on water
A mix of death and semen
Climax a different prayer as they cry out to heaven
Help them. Help this.
As the music grips the flesh makes it dance
Outside the bone. Unhinge the mouth
Enter the soul. As seed falls on grounds that donât grow
As I kiss the sick, the maimed and the old
Hug lepers and expel the demons they hold
But I am no lord, no body dressed a ray of light
As I kneel before men an act of obeisance
Move my prayers between their legs
Climax their salvation
How can I be anyoneâs Moses when I still crave deliverance?
My spirit begs this question
As I plead a different need asking for a liquid blessing
But I am no savior
I cannot raise the dead up
There are bodies that have died in me
Some I have not buried yet
In this I rest
Put on my best
And wait for the end at 4am
Where I become resurrected again
A spirit refreshed
Waiting for this worn old body to catch its second death.
Aunt Jemima and the Colonization of Attraction Â
For years I was born with an oppressed tongue
Coated with the sweet taste of my own bondage
I did not know better because breakfast was good
Tasted like love, the hot butter Sunday melted soft
On stacks of racked up flap jacks & flour dough
My pancake box caged a beautiful brown soul
Who looked like love and hopeful slave songs
Head covered with a bright white patterned scarf
Teeth smiling like she was proud to be on that box
Every morning I would see her sing her way to my plate
As I watched face full of apple cheeks, grinning all the way
The nameless joy of being full off such unknown undoing
Then school came. The black girls never looked good on the playground
During recess, they all looked like struggle
They made my face feel good as I smiled a full hunger
But I was awful. I never learned how to love them. Not like I thought I ought to
I never remembered that mama did the cooking
I always just saw a steaming plate of hotcakes
Find their way to my lonely plate never asking how they got there in the first place
I drenched the cooked hot flour with thick rich syrup
Laughing at the sticky-lipped grinning boy cast inside my mirror
Learning to love him every bit as less as I learned to love them,
The women on the box. Caught in the mirror with the man
Who sees them only on Sunday mornings with cheeks full & smiling again.
Luis Pabon is a poet and spoken word artist born and raised in Bronx, NY. He is the author of six books of poetry, most recently Boy Butter (2020), and one chapbook, Ricanstruction (2016), which explores his Black and Puerto Rican heritage. Luis currently resides in Albany, NY, and is working on his next full collection of poems, entitled Earthâs Bad Mouth, slated for a 2021 release.
Image: Film still from “Outline 2” by Alan Coon
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