Crystal shards, the results of your broken mask,
your trust exposed, faith always the inference of a neophyte,
and our bare heels grind these pieces of expensive glass
that once held your perspective on a former world.

Savior . . . savior . . .
who would think to toil onward in these plots,
and who will ever come to reach you,
yourself, before your hands are at last taken away?

The virus of fear can strike instantly, you know,
and infuse all your nerves with a crawling venom
to impede any further glimmer of courage,
yet fortitude was always one of your vast secrets.
There are few spirits left, this is clear,
so perhaps it’s your turn to wing off
as an angel, as someone for us all to hold . . .
an embrace might be the most important relief.

And how did Jesus come to be a god, and not you?
For he aspired to be of human acts, even death,
but you embraced the actual human disease --
which he avoided by his young death -- of daily disintegration,
in our case, greatly enhanced. We are metaphors, are we not?
Most humans are afraid to look upon our skin,
for here they see their own eventual flesh . . .
a similar fate for all the corporal ones, only ours happens before burial.

So you don’t need your mask any more
because no one back in the homeland
would recognize this re-ordered face of yours,
and worse, they cannot even recognize your deeds,
your terminal fate, you who have never spoken
once about regret, about the crucifix
we fashioned for you out of your own love of us.