Paul
A man at thirteen, he led
his lamb to temple for
slaughter, knew Hebrew
songs, the taste & sting
of desert sand. He spoke
Aramaic, wrote in Greek
through a glass darkly,
turn the other cheek,
without which what’s
a beggar between thieves,
nailed to another crucifix?
He saw Steven dragged
from the Sanhedrin,
but cast no stone.
Christopher
Saint of thoroughfares
& teamsters, available
wherever goods & souls
need to be hauled–
lugged overland, galley
slave-rowed–once a thug
called Reprobus, he mowed
the Devil down with his
backhand, his brandished
cross. The Christ child
put on serious pounds,
mid-river in his arms.
John of the Cross
His jailers claimed
divine light filled
his cell the night
he slipped away–
a rope of tied-together
sheets, a padlock
picked by Mary,
the radiant lady who
held out her hand
when in dark
toddlerhood he fell
into his uncle’s pond.
Hilary Sideris is the author of The Orange Juice Is Over (Finishing Line Press 2008) and Baby (Pudding House Press 2009). Her poems have recently appeared in Arts & Letters, Barrow Street, Connecticut Review, Confrontation, PMS, Poet Lore, Salamander, Swink, and Tar River Poetry. Her chapbook, Gold & Other Fish is now available from Finishing Line Press. She works as a staff developer in language and literacy programs at The City University of New York.
*Photo courtesy of Art History Images (Holly Hayes).