No More Feather Pillow

No More Feather Pillow

(“Watch out for people will take you to court and have you beaten in their meeting places.” Matthew 10:17)

No more feather pillow, just a rock for my head;
no more easy money, only the rich get fed;
no more pleasant parades, new words we cried and prayed;
no more banners restreamed, only criminal scenes.

The secrets lie behind the curtains of arrest and handcuffed lips,
the mystery a fragrant scent that wafts above the burial pits,
the wonder a joy that sits beneath the gloom,
a glad day that waves off paper doom.

The child who leads them, the little in the laps
of the imprisoned of this world can tell us more
than the edicts of frightened senators and kings
overdoing their rice skin years of fame.

My salary is only today, just a month from forgotten;
my compositions decay, my shirt’s organic cotton,
my guitars crack in low humidity,
my dollars lack any liquidity
but my eyes can see beyond the sun.

Hearts still race at the angry words that would steal
time from lives a few paragraphs longs;
Hands grow cold when lisps of accusation bring
heavy machinery to trap a life between parentheses.

But above and beyond, I’ll drive my car straight up
for an hour until all atmosphere is gone. From there
I’ll see the funny courtroom scenes that try to
capture the redeemed,
domesticate the wild
and incarcerate the people now set
free.