Worship

I say "cathedral"
when I want to speak of
a holy place that is dark
when seen from outside
through a door and instead
turns out to be
full of light.  That’s
what a Catholic boy does
when he looks past his lapse,
back at what he once felt.

If I had been born
elsewhere, as another man,
I might instead speak of
the synagogue of Worms, Germany, called
the Rashi Shul, razed twice
and built back to God each time;
might mention
the Blue Mosque of Istanbul,
repurposed long ago
into mosque from cathedral,
and which still can sharpen
any viewer’s inhale. 

I am not any of the men
who still look to brick and mortar,
stone and glass, as a house of God.
I know there are evils buried in their foundations,
I know how the good words spoken inside them
have some times set in motion the chains, whips,
biases, murders, wars…

I am far down a highway
now, one where asphalt and desert
have opened me to spirit and light
I never dreamed of.  I am no Catholic boy,
no chosen man, no hajji any other hajjii
would recognize…

I know enough, though, to understand
that every highway starts somewhere,
and God at the beginning is God at the end,
and where there is God, even a hidden one,
even one masked by profanity,

there is always a story
worth hearing
of a journey
from someplace to
this place.