Faith

A patron saint of good circumstance
and found money
slipped off the earth into a ravine 
and was lost.

A patron saint of lost causes
went missing. 

A patron saint of pastry chefs,
coated in flour, stopped breathing.

Are you hungry? Are you broke?
Are you forever lamenting your luck?
A patron saint of the pure voice
pushed his earplugs deep into his head
the minute you started complaining.

God doesn’t love you.
God doesn’t see you, in fact.
God reserves holy oversight
for the largest:  play of planets
and stars, winds and climate
and sustainability.  You’re the mote
carried through the grand scale.

All right then:

are you ready now
to save yourself?  Isn’t this
bracing —

the cold 
we find ourselves out in
and how we have no choice
but to stay awake?