CHARLES PLYMELL

Pope Visits Mexico

I watched the televison news of the great arrival
Swelled masses around the bullet-proof popemobile
Something cartoon-like about the pontiff's wheels
And something too serious about a sea of people

The news cameras panned over the masses
Focused in on a man who was standing beside
A life-size cardboard cut out of the pope
A photo opportunity collage background mass
To be put in the icon stack in the living room

The reporter then interviewed a woman standing with
Child in her arms, the only madonna and child in Chiapas
He asked her why she wasn't making her way
Down in the masses converging to see the pope

He's just like any other man, she said, no more, no less
A human born to this earth of flesh and blood like you and me
She was just there because the crowd formed around her village
I will search for her forever and kneel to her simple radiance

She is the frail hope of a spirit beyond this polluted flesh, this life
That populates the unknown like a cancer destroying its host
Abstracting its gods in icons, symbols, and beliefs, and blame
And incredible, murderous sufferings that all religions bring

In the bellows of distance of all blank space we meet in spirit
Beyond the cartoon revelations that destroy this world adrift
Beyond those praying masses with their asses in the air
Beyond those praying banging their heads to the wall
Beyond the born again lynch mobs pointing to another scapegoat
Who all claim for certain something holy beyond this dying planet
Who all contribute daily in some way to death and destruction

August, 2002