Churchgoing

The Lutherans sit stolidly in rows;

only their children feel the holy ghost

that makes them jerk and bobble and almost

destroys the pious atmosphere for those

whose reverence bows their backs as if in work.

The congregation sits, or stands to sing,

or chants the dusty creeds automaton.

Their voices drone like engines, on and on,

and they remain untouched by everything;

confession, praise, or likewise, giving thanks.

The organ that they saved years to afford

repeats the Sunday rhythms song by song,

slow lips recite the credo, smother yawns,

and ask forgiveness for being so bored.

 

I, too, am wavering on the edge of sleep,

and ask myself again why I have come

to probe the ruins of this dying cult.

I come bearing the cancer of my doubt

as superstitious suffering women come

to touch the magic hem of a saint's robe.

 

Yet this has served two centuries of men

as more than superstitious cant; they died

believing simply. Women, satisfied

that this was truth, were racked and burned with them

for empty words we moderns merely chant.

 

We sing a spiritual as the last song,

and we are moved by a peculiar grace

that settles a new aura on the place.

This simple melody, though sung all wrong,

captures exactly what I think is faith.

Were you there when they crucified my Lord?

That slaves should suffer in his agony!

That Christian, slave-owning hypocrisy

nevertheless was by these slaves ignored

as they pitied the poor body of Christ!

Oh, sometimes it causes me to tremble,

that they believe most, who so much have lost.

To be a Christian one must bear a cross.

I think belief is given to the simple

as recompense for what they do not know.

 

I sit alone, tormented in my heart

by fighting angels, one group black, one white.

The victory is uncertain, but tonight

I'll lie awake again, and try to start

finding the black way back to what we've lost.

Marilyn Nelson, For the Body (Louisiana State University Press, 1978)