Oh boy am I gonna regret this...I write very few religious subject poems
but I once read a letter by the Spanish Jesuit Peter Claver of his work
among the newly-arrived slaves brought to South America, and it sort of
had at me.
THE PRAYER OF PETER CLAVER, S.J.
(CARTAGENA, 1635)
1
Every day they bring us these ruins stacked
like spent firewood upon the muddy planks.
I sit safe, Father, at end of day, but
all I can see in the lamplight, in my book,
are their eyes, glowing like the eyes of cats.
I hear their cat-voices, hissing, snarling,
crying out the names of their gods which are
one name, Yours: a feral madrigal of fear
of abandonment that You have left them only
Your many names to curse and weep, chant
the names of those whose bodies lay in chains
at the Atlantic bottom, gifts to the sea
whose god also bears Your name.
And each day I go to them, build fires,
give food, tell them Your name, the Father of slaves
they are and shall become, the Father of free men
they are and shall remain: bathe their wounds
in sacramental wine, whisper of how my
little living water frees them, not from chains,
sweat, or the lash, but from the fear that
You would leave them.
2
Father-God, forgive me for giving them their gods,
belief in Your sacred many Selves
salved upon their dark, mangled flesh.
Father-God, forgive me the trespass of a promise
only You can keep.
Father-God, forgive me for praying I am not a hopeless liar
who will burn for these thousands I cannot count, so many,
for having given only water that cannot quench their bodies' agony.
Father-God, forgive me the justice turned to curdled mockery
when I bring them with me into the Cathedral itself.
For I have watched the ladies of the country
I shall never see again glare at me as though
I'd brought wildcats into the church, leave in rustling fury,
then heard my loves purr, squall, lap the Host
upon their tongues like milk, nourishment to serve.
3: The Names, 1888
So today they call me Saint.
Once, in the port of Cartagena,
on the plantations of the nobles,
they called me Satan, wished me
dragged to the stake and garrot.
The slave who cleaned up after me,
cleaned me dry before my death,
called me an old fool for thinking
I could free anyone, save anyone
when I could not save myself.
I named myself when first I came there:
Slave of the Slaves, their subject
embracing torments, smells
that rose to Heaven with my soul,
if indeed this is Heaven.
My body has passed beyond corruption,
and so have theirs whose souls I fought to save,
and yet what have I changed?
What have I done but what I promised?--
to labor and not count the cost, nor
seek reward but in the doing of Your will.
My children labor yet, lashed, tormented
and tormentor alike, all slaves, tied to a cross:
salvific, bloody, Yours, mine, ours.
KTW/2-14-00, rev. 6-24-04
--
Kenneth Wolman
Proposal Development Department
Room SW334
Sarnoff Corporation
609-734-2538
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