The Taste of Apples Underground
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In winter, they fashion paradise in fancy wool. Multitudes make vows, horse-and-buggied in leather pews through the Eden of Central Park. Wait for evening white, innocent ones. Meet it there—where they look to liars, their blankets and their love, for warmth, for something to believe. The setting sun will show you truths they deny, how oaths are really taken in big cold cities. To know the frozen lowdown of this church you must descend, to prophets propped on corners, numb eyes upward with a distant grief, to apostles snoring in doorways, drooling penance, confessing weakness in white bursts, to women who men worship beneath the cross of their thighs. Legs are spread, hands are spread, knees are bruised, clouds of prayers dissipate in subway steam. Wait for night—and follow stained steps down to the echoes of dead faithful turning in their sleep. Descend, until you hear the scattered rattles of fallen angels, until you see souls scurry into tunnels chasing the sins of whispering snakes. Have they bled enough to forget the suffering, to long for it once more? Nothing captures religion better than temptation—it’s like the garden. There is a lure, a red offering, reminders you have teeth. And then a bite, a promise that even hell is temperate and green. (first appeared in Blue Fifth Review) by Patrick Carrington |
art by Pat Jones
